Retire to Ecuador? Why not!

Everyone knows how we love the views from our apartment, I mean the photos we share say it all. (Have you ever peeked at our SmugMug album , just for the views?) The light and views are a big part of this apartment and we hated to obscur that with curtains, even sheers. When we moved in, we bought a room-darkening roman shade for the master bedroom from the former tenant. It has worked out well since the morning sun, especially in summer (NOW), a 6:30 sunrise can be a bit bright. Well, we got a visit from the gal renting on the third floor, same apartment layout as ours. She is heading back to the states and wondered if we would be interested in buying her window coverings. Although we still weren't sure we wanted anything, the bright afternoon sun was drivin us away from our desks every day. So we went down to her place to look. As soon as we saw them, we were sold! When pulled up, you can't even tell there are window covers, other than the beaded drawstings. When you

We've been busy this past week and it looks like more of the same next week. We have enjoyed meeting several new couples, some closer to making a decision on whether & where to move, some a few years out but on the same exploratory trip. We've continue doing a lot of walking, at least for us. We aren't up to the 10k steps a day mark but doing way more than we did during our RV ife in the US. It feels good and having such a great city to walk in as well as several beautiful rivers to walk along, definitely helps. So here's a synopsis of our week. We started out by meeting up with new friends, Heidi and Steve (Risa and Jerry on Facebook). We had lunch at Don Colon's and really enjoyed our time with them. They were supposed to meet other expat friends, Stephen and Nancy, at Tutto Fredo at two. Well, a few minutes after, Nancy and Steve show up at Don Colon. They knew where to find them. Great folks, still probably a year or two away from making any major change

We have made many new friends here including Ricardo and Roger who own and run Paladar's Restaurante here in Cuenca. We'd only been there once but enjoyed it so much we wanted to do it again. When we saw an announcement about Bobcat Jack  performing at Paladar's on January 16th and we immediately sent in our reservations. We found a couple of good friends who were interested as well and they joined us. Well, did we ever get more than we bargained for! The food was wonderful - this was the menu for the 3-course meal. Starter: Thai Crunch Salad with Peanut Dressing Main Course: Pork Tenderloin medallions topped with pear chutney served with cheesy smashed potatoes and seasoned roasted vegetable medley Dessert: Carrot-pineapple cake with cream cheese frosting Yes, it was as delicious as it sounds! Because the house was overbooked (sellout+), the time between courses was a little slow but the conversation at our table more than made up for that. We meandered dow

Well, maybe not, but here in Cuenca we run into parades often enough that it feels that way. Yesterday was a nice day for heading into El Centro for a walk. I needed to meet up with our tagua man to see if the turtles I ordered for my sister-in-law were ready to pick up. We headed in after lunch, took a leisurely walk to the artisan shop (Casa de la Mujer) but the tagua man was closed. Assuming he was out to lunch, we headed to Don Colon's for a cup of coffee. The sun was shining, it was busy everywhere, vendors everywhere selling everything from the usual wares to shoe laces to these cute little hats we saw on toddlers (and of course I could never catch a shot of them). Aliens? Bugs? Not sure... The flower market was full of people enjoying the sun on a crisp day. While at Don Colon's we were joined by several friends, we sat for over an hour chatting, enjoying our coffee and watching the sights. After that we headed back to see if the tagua m