In short
Quito and Kraków were the first two World Heritage sites, in 1978. Quito's colonial centre is the best preserved in Latin America and it is vast.
The city sits at two thousand eight hundred metres, wedged between volcanoes. Pichincha is reached by cable car to four thousand metres from the city itself.
What it really costs
Ecuador uses the US dollar, which removes any exchange risk. Living costs remain among the lowest on the continent for a capital.
The whole country fits inside an eight-hour bus radius: the Amazon, the coast, the Andes and Quito all sit within the same transport budget.
What nobody tells you
The altitude is higher than Bogotá's and tells more. Going up Cotopaxi or Pichincha the day after arriving is a bad idea: two nights in the city first.
The old centre empties and shuts after dark. The districts where people go out in the evening are La Floresta and La Mariscal, not the historic centre.
Security has deteriorated in some coastal cities, Guayaquil above all, while the sierra stays calm. This is a country where the itinerary matters more than the country.
