ecuador officially uses the us dollar (excludng the us, the third country in my travels thus far: el salvador, panama, ecuador). here, more than in other ccountries, coins are everywhere. it means that you need a small bag or dedicated pocket to handle the 10-30 large coins that you may be carrying at any given time. you know all those sacajawea $1 coins that were launched in 2000, but never really took off? well, they all seem to have ended up here.

this morning i took a taxi to transoceanica. they occupy about 6 floors of edificio sudamerica, a building near the water…but unfortunately i was stuck waiting in the windowless office for several hours waiting for papework and for them to unload the car at the port. thanks to eli for his gift of ‘heart of darkness’. i got all the paperwork sorted out (…i hope), but i won’t be picking up the sentra until tomorrow (…i hope).

just outside of the building is malecon 2000 — a really nice gated promenade along the riverbank. it’s clean, has cool art, a small park (with fish), remote control cars/boats, cafe’s, a museum and even an imax! there’s also a mcdonalds here….which has an incredible view (perhaps the best located fast food joint….after the kfc? on the beach in pacifica). it was so nice, i ended up eating there (…maybe the first fast food i’ve had in a few years?).

malecon is really thin (50 yards wide?) but almost a kilometer long. on the east side, malecon leads to a manecured pedestrian path through las penas. the staired path up las penas feels very nice and very fake…kinda like disney land. this illusion becomes apparent at some points along the path…where an arched entrance divides the clean (safe) from the dirty (dangerous). similar to many other places in the world, some of the best locations (i.e.–a hill overlooking the city and river) are also some of the poorest.

pics:
scaffolding is an interesting combination of metal, rope and bamboo
malecon and las penas (taken from malecon)
the stairs of las penas (just like disneyland)
las penas archway dividing imaginary from reality
malecon (picture taken from mcdonalds)