Coffee at the hotel, followed by an interview at a nearby radio station.


Around 11AM we leave in a van for a cable car that will take us up one of the mountains surrounding Quito. We will rise from 10,000 feet to 13,500 feet in about 15 minutes.


From the station at the top we see Quito below and above us the peak of the mountain beckons. I want to walk up toward the peak, but we don’t have the time. Traveling in Tibet in 2006 made me fall in love with mountains and I find that they liberate my spirit more than a Tucson… (see the diary entry for Thursday, January 24th)


After returning to the hotel I do four TV interviews at the hotel. The second interviewer tells me that hers is a light and funny program. Later she says that I am so serious. I smile and shrug my shoulders. I am a guitar player, not a comedian, I think and, given the right circumstance (like being able to communicate in a language I understand and speak) I can be hilarious…

In the evening we get a little tour of Quito. The oldest church, a beautiful basilica from the 1500’s:


The stairs in front of the basilica, littered with rose petals – Ecuador produces half of the roses sold in the U.S.A.:


The old, colonial part of Quito with its beautiful buildings and narrow streets:


We meet a reporter and her camera-man in front of a theater and I do the last interview of the day. I snap this photo while she listens to the translator:


We have dinner at a restaurant in the recently gentrified red light district, a place called Tapas Y Vinos. This turns pout to be an excellent choice. The tapas keep coming and the wine flows.