Friday 18 May 2012

Day 57 - Cuenca, Ecuador (14 May 2012)

Day 57 – Cuenca, Ecuador (14 May 2012)

This morning we are undecided if we are going to stay another night in Cuenca or not.  We decide that we will make the decision at the end of the day depending on how much we get done during the day.  We eat breakfast at the hostel (bought from the supermarket the day before) and head on our way into town.  We head back into the city centre to finish off our sightseeing there.  The city was a bit busier today since it is a Monday morning, but still not that busy and nothing in comparison to Guayaquil.  Anyway we are about to finish our sightseeing in the city centre and then head to the fringe of the CBD to go to a couple of museums.  I see a building that is quite nice, so I head across the road to get a better angle for a picture.  I pull out my camera, line up the photo and before I could click, BANG, I got a smack to the head! I turn around and see this fella sprinting away from me.  He was looking back at me as he was running.  I was a bit shocked, and I look around and all the locals are just looking at me, no one was coming up to me to see if I was alright.  I then walked back over the road to talk to Ann who was waiting for me to take my picture, and she was in disbelief about what happened.  Apparently, as we have read in our lonely planet book, people in some cities around Ecuador try and knock tourists out with a tackle around the neck and when they are on the ground for a couple of minutes, they steal all their gear.  Well this guys arm knocked my neck and his fist got me right behind the ear.  I am either tough and can handle a hit like that or this guy is an amateur because I hardly flinched.   I do have a wee bump on my head now.  Maybe all those days playing footy has hardened me up.  Listen to me, talking myself up! But in all seriousness though, it gave me a bit of a fright when I reflected on what happened.  It certainly made our decision easier as to if we were going to stay another night in Cuenca, the answer is definitely NO!!!!  This continues the Ecuadorian theme so far that people are a lot ruder than we have previously encountered in Peru, Bolivia, Argentina and Chile.  We head back to the hostel for a little bit to calm down, then we head to the first museum,  Museo del Banco Central ‘Pumapungo’.  This museum is famous for the sidplay of ‘tsantsas’ (shrunken heads).  It was crazy to see these shrunken head’s, they are even smaller than a new born babies head.   The one thing that was disappointing about this museum is they didn’t explain how they actually shrunk their heads! (and there was English explanations too). Out the back of this museum is a garden park so we have a wander through here.  We come across some birds locked in a cage.  The last cage we came across had some Toucans which are very colourful birds with a distinctive beak.  We were hoping to see these on the Inca Trail but we lucked out so it was good to see them now.  We then went to Museo de las Culturas Aborigenes which has over 5000 archaeological pieces representative of about 20 Ecuadorian pre-Columbian cultures.  After this museum we were done with this city.  I was over the place and just wanted to leave.  We went back to the hostel about mid afternoon and then watched a movie and had an early night.

1 comment:

  1. We are planning on two nights and one full day in Cuenca. I was wondering is it worth the detour from Guayaquil to Banos (that's where we will head next) We were thinking about spending the day at the Inca ruins not far from Cuenca. Just wanted an opinion from someone who has been there. :) I'm enjoying your blog.

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