Ecuador Travel Expenses

During our month in Ecuador, we saw big cities, small towns, hiked the Andes, relaxed in thermal pools, and even took a week of Spanish class. Ecuador has a lot more to offer, but we never had time to see it all. There is an entire coastline along the Pacific Ocean and the opposite side of the country is home to the Amazon jungle. Our travel style is definitely slowing down a bit, having been on the road for four months now, so there still remains a lot of Ecuador we'd like to see one day if we return.

A parade in Latacunga.

In some ways, Ecuador does not feel all that different from Colombia. The food is somewhat similar, the small towns are just as charming, and the Andes are as spectacular as always. The differences are a bit subtle. Ecuador feels like it displays its cultural roots a bit more openly than Colombia. People wearing traditional attire can be found even in the largest of cities. Ecuador’s tourist infrastructure is built up and well established. This makes getting around and finding information a fairly straightforward task. What we gained in ease of travel we gave up in our ability to get off the beaten path. Although admittedly, we didn’t try as hard as we could have. We had to make it from Quito to Perú, and there is really only one way to reasonably do this, stopping at most of the places on our Ecuador itinerary.

A view over Quito's Old City.

Despite Quito’s size, it is actually a very charming city to explore. We had fun indulging in Ecuador’s craft beer scene, which has its epicenter around Plaza Foch. Old City, with its grand Colonial architecture, was a great place to walk around. There are plenty of historical buildings, parks, coffee shops, and small restaurants to explore.

Hiking past farms on the Quilotoa Loop.

Our hike around the Quilotoa Loop was a wonderful experience. The scenery was beautiful, the accommodations along the way were surprisingly nice, and who can complain about sitting in a hot tub on top of a mountain after hiking all day long?

Thermal springs in Baños. The sunset this night was amazing, but I was relaxing in the pool and didn't have a camera on me.

Baños is a small city with endless possibilities. Yes, it’s very touristy, but it’s also understandable why so many people go there. The town sits in a sem-tropical valley with volcanoes and mountains to explore and you can even ride a bike downhill all the way to the Amazon jungle. Despite the possibilities, we were more than happy to sit in the thermal pools until our legs fully recovered from our long hike.

One of our better accommodations, while staying in Cuenca.

And then there was that time we got a room with five beds in Latacunga. It was all they had, and it worked...

Our Spanish classes in Cuenca were very memorable. The classes themselves were excellent. Our teachers were superb, and it made the week a lot of fun. Cuenca was by far the most interesting city we visited in Ecuador. The architecture and surrounding mountains are beautiful and the city was just plain fun to walk around and explore.

One night in Cuenca we ordered a large pizza and beer and accidentally ate it all. 

I’m still not sure how we keep doing this without really trying, but we continued to stick to our budget in Ecuador, which came in at $99 per day. This even included our week of Spanish classes. Maybe it’s not that surprising considering how affordable Ecuador is. Our average accommodation was only $25 per night, and you can easily get an enormous lunch for around $3-4. Transportation by bus anywhere in the country was inexpensive and easy. Most of our transportation expense was from the flight into the country.

Accommodations: Airbnb continues to be our go-to service for finding accommodations. We also stayed at a couple small hotels/hostels when we didn’t have the time to make advanced arrangements. We had also learned at this point that it is way cheaper to just show up someplace than it is to book in advance.

Restaurants: We had lots of inexpensive menus of the day. They can get old after a while, always consisting of soup, rice, grilled meat, and juice. Fortunately, international food was never hard to come by and dinner was where we spent the most.

Transportation: We flew from Colombia into Quito and took buses within Ecuador. There were also a handful of Uber and taxi rides around Quito and Cuenca.

Spanish School: Spanish school was $9 per hour. We each took 3 hours of class a day for 5 days.

Drinks: Our largest bills were from craft beer breweries in Quito and Cuenca. The rest was mostly coffee.

Grocery: We’re pretty consistent on this one. We had kitchens in a couple of our Airbnb accommodations and had breakfast at home as often as possible and made the occasional dinner.

Tourism: Entrance fees to various attractions around Quito and the thermal pools in Baños.

Other: A SIM card, laundry, haircut, and the very expensive DHL shipment of our absentee voting ballots.

My classroom for Spanish lessons.

We had a great time in Ecuador, but so far on our trip it doesn’t stand out that much. We certainly have no complaints and we’re glad we visited, but at the same time our experiences there don’t seem to be bubbling up to the top of our list of favorite memories from the trip. There are probably a few reasons for this. The first is that our travel style is slowing down. We feel like if we don’t spend a week somewhere, we haven’t really had a chance to experience it. This is a far cry from our three-week holiday trips in past years where we would run around to different locations every few days. In Ecuador we tended to spend longer in places and that prevented us from seeing everything Ecuador had to offer. We had also just come from Colombia, which has a somewhat similar feel to it. Had we done this trip in reverse, starting in Ecuador and ending in Colombia, I bet we would have had stronger memories from Ecuador having experienced things for the first time there. Regardless, we still had some great times in Ecuador. We are also excited to be headed onward to Perú!