South America Trip Day 7 - Quito to Guayaquil

We decided to go to Guayaquil from Quito by bus. Busses to Guayaquil all start from Quito's southern bus terminal in Quitumbe. The terminal was pretty awesome - very clean, big and also had free wi-fi. There wasn't a whole lot of rush at the terminal and we were able to get tickets by reaching there a little early. There are two reputed companies - PanAmericana Internacional and Transportes Ecuador - which have frequent busses to Guayaquil every day. We took the PanAmericana Internacional bus which was scheduled to leave at 8:20 AM from the terminal. While loading our luggage onto the bus, the conductor tagged the luggage and we had to hold on to the tags to get the bags back later. The bus stopped at several locations along the way and we got to see some very interesting sights as the bus took us through the Andes into the western plains.

Inside Quitumbe terminal

Outside Quitumbe terminal

I'm not sure at what height we were crossing the Andes but we were constantly in and out of the clouds. Visibility was a little low - we could see the cliffs and the valleys as the bus went around bends but at several points it was as though there was a white blanket hanging outside our window. It took us a few hours to get off the windy roads and into the plains.

Through the clouds!

We crossed a lot of small towns and large farms along the way. Some of the towns had interesting plazas/roundabouts. There was one which had a statue of multiple stools stacked on top of each other. There was another one which had several large statues of fruits. There were lots and lots of banana and pineapple plantations, mango trees, rice fields and some plants that looked like  they had cocoa pods hanging off them. Also got to see many egrets and eagle/hawk-like birds flying around. All through this section, vendors would get on and off the bus selling snacks, fruits, etc.

We reached Guayaquil bus terminal by 5 PM. It was a long ride (but not as long as the one we planned on doing to go from Guayaquil to Lima later) but it was interesting to get a glimpse of the Ecuadorian country side.

Guayaquil bus terminal