Getting There

After my best friends wedding (not the movie) in Gulfport we left for Miami. The weather was less than perfect, to put it mildly. We spent the next 12 hours traveling on what should have been a 5 hour trip. After hopping from one canceled flight to another it felt a little like musical airplanes.  Our original arrival time was 5:00pm and we arrived in Miami at 10:30pm tired and hoping that our flight tomorrow went smoother.

The next day was our friend and soon to be travel partener Shalom's birthday. We spent the day with him, having a last look at the city we called home for a year. After a lovely but hot day we were ready for the cool temperatures of South American winter. 

On arrival the first thing we did was change money. After countless hours of research we had negleted to find out that Ecuador uses the dollar. The cashier at the bank gave us a strange and slightly annoyed look as she took our American dollars and gave us back American dollars. According to our taxi driver Ecuador has been using the dollar for ten years now. We discovered this and other colorful Quito facts after ten minutes or so of hagaling on the fare rate. Hagaling is something that I have never done before. According to a guide book taxis from the airport do not have to use a meter and you are supposed to hagal for a fare. The hagaling did not stop there everything is negotiable but that does not mean that we are good at it. Case in point, our first meal. The meal was a typical serving of marinated flank steak, rice, lentils, and potatoes. We were overcharged but what could we do we had already eaten it. Lesson one ... always ask before you buy.