Cuenca and Baños

Our very first overnight-guests arrived Friday.  We hired our driver (Manny) on Saturday to go to the Panama Hat Museum, the Overlook of Cuenca and then to Baños.

Carlos and Milagros, from Guayaquil, came to visit for the weekend.  They were such good hosts to us when we first arrived in Ecuador.  

Carlos came to Cuenca, from Guayaquil, every summer when he was a child ( he is now 82 yrs. old).

He had not been here for many years so it was fun to hear how things were when he was young.

Our first stop was the Panama Hat Museum.  

Panama hats have been made in Ecuador since the 17th century.

After President Roosevelt was photographed at the Panama Canal, the hats were called Panama hats.

From Wikipedia:

In 1904, President Theodore Rooseveltof the United States visited the construction site of the Panama Canal, and was photographed wearing a Panama hat, which further increased the hats' popularity. The hats were later worn by many early-twentieth century film stars during films.^{[citation needed]}

Hats in every color!

Even a wedding dress and flowers woven from the same palm-like plant.

Sewing room!

Display in museum store.

Carlos loves hats!

Then off to the look-out Mt. to view Cuenca.

Carlos, Milgros, me and Bob

Restaurant overlooking Cuenca

City of Cuenca (500k people)

Cuenca

Catholic church at top of the Mt. by the lookout.
Then off to Baños....

Road to Baños (about 15 min. ride from Cuenca) - in distance see 500 yr. old church

Baños is at the foot of a mountain where natural warm mineral water flows. There are 2 mineral pools that you can spend $10/day and soak in them.  They are said to have many health benefits for joint pain, arthritis and other physical aliments.
(Bob and I did a similar 'soak' in Iceland at the Blue Lagoon!  We still talk about how wonderful that was.)  We will try the springs in Baños some day soon.

Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe - Baños

Men readying church for Sunday Mass (Sept. 7th is an annual celebration to Our Lady of Guadalupe.)

Main alter

Side alter

Kids playing soccer outside church

Stopped for lunch

Manny, our taxi driver for the day

He actually lives in Baños, wife teaches school there.

Speaks some English but so friendly and hospitable.

 Stopped at the open air mercado and spent $8.00 plus

$10.00 for about 2 lbs of peeled shrimp.

Above: 4 plantains,7 tomatoes, 3 red bell peppers, 5 carrots, large bunch

of scallions,, bag of peeled garlic, 2 large papayas and 6 fruit for juice  (naranjillo).  Also, 2 large peeled onions.

Milagros is going to show me how to make the juice and prepare the plantains.

Home to prepare dinner.  Turned out none of us were hungry,

so we settled for tea and ham sandwiches.


It seems someone lost my camera - so no more posts until I can find another one.
Electronics are very expensive here so I may have to wait until someone is coming here to bring me a new one.