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By Deke Castleman For many years, Cuenca has offered a handful of strictly vegetarian restaurants, but the choices continue to improve as the world, including Cuenca, embraces vegetarian options and lifestyles. Nector Tea House Last Octo   [...]

By Deke Castleman Ketzel Levine is sitting in a vegetarian restaurant in Cuenca. She pauses in her narrative of how she went from a long career at National Public Radio to animal advocacy in Cuenca, and checks her watch. She has an important commi   [...]

[email protected] With Thanksgiving and Christmas past and New Year upon us there is one food dish whose popularity will quickly wane until the Fall of the coming year.  Though you could eat turkey anytime, it seems dearest to the celebrat   [...]

By SUSAN SCHENCK From nearly anywhere in Cuenca, look south (toward the rivers), then raise your gaze and you'll see a big white church on a hill. The Church of Turi, with a commanding view of the entire Andean valley, has been home to civilzation   [...]

By LANCE BRASHEAR With Christmas season upon us perhaps you have already tried the traditional desserts served during the holidays.  The sweets on this page can be enjoyed throughout the year but are fancied even more during the holidays.  There a   [...]

By DAVID MORRILL To tourists and foreign residents, Cuenca's Christmas Eve “Pase del Niño” parade, or Passing of the Child, is a colorful, often bizarre, mixture of the sacred and the profane. To locals, it is a time-honored Christian festival of   [...]

By David Morrill Where most woodworkers see problems, Ed Konderla sees possibilities. "The wood I use would be thrown on the burn pile by most carpenters. It's unstable and gnarly, and it wouldn't work for furniture or general carpentry," he sa   [...]

By LANCE BRASHEAR Not all cities have personality, at least not the kind which makes itself apparent through the everyday activities and annual festivities of the town.  Celebrations throughout the year lend identity, from the feast of Corpus Ch   [...]

By DAVID MORRILL "If you told me ten years ago that I would live in Ecuador one day, I would have told you that you were crazy," says Sharon Monroe, a 64-year-old grandmother and retired restaurateur from Redwood City, California. "At that point i   [...]

By DEKE CASTLEMAN It seems that Mexican cuisine is just as popular in Cuenca as it is in other parts of the world. In recent years, the options for Mexican food have broadened and today we take a look at a few of the great place to enjoy the cuisi   [...]

By DEKE CASTLEMAN Atahualpa.  Gil Ramirez Davalos. Luis Cordero. Padre Aguirre. Presidente Borrero. Remigio Crespo. Parque Calderón. These names fill the history books of Ecuador, and dot the city map of Cuenca. But who were these people? A   [...]

By LANCE BRASHEAR Very few things in Cuenca are new, which gives the city part of its charm.  Many things in Cuenca, however, have been renewed, remodeled, refurbished, or restored, giving them a new use and a new life.  Eight years ago, following   [...]

By DEKE CASTLEMAN In 1897, 16-year-old Rosalía Suarez carried ice from Mt. Imbabura to her home in Ibarra in northern Ecuador. In a large copper pail, she mixed tropical fruit juices with the ice, inventing "helados de paila," or copper-pail sherb   [...]

By LANCE BRASHEAR  It is a surprise, to say the least.  To walk into a traditional, colonial-style hotel in Cuenca, a UNESCO world heritage city renowned for its Spanish, colonial legacy, and discover a crowd of gringos eating everything from hamb   [...]

By Deke Castleman Far more than just transportation, motorcycles have always been associated with thrill-seekers and daredevils, rebels and outlaws, escapists and freedom-lovers. Motorcycles have always symbolized a rejection of the scheduled, seg   [...]

By LANCE BRASHEAR When the El Jardin Restaurant in Cuenca moved from  its 20-year location on Cordova Street near Borrero, manager Daniel Duran says, "many people lost the trail," to finding us.  But if there is anything to say about its relocatio   [...]

By LANCE BRASHEAR  Everywhere you go in Cuenca, the establishments seem to retain a sense of the past, an identity that is not erased, despite the changing times.   Cuenca is renowned for its preservation of colonial architecture and traditional e   [...]

By LANCE BRASHEAR  To see all of the wonderful art and artisan craft traditions of Ecuador would require travels, investigations, and genuine searches throughout the country, as Ecuador is a land rich in craftsmanship.  But there is one pla   [...]

By LANCE BRASHEAR  There is perhaps no other place where you can be as close to the Incan Empire as when you visit  Ingapirca, site of Ecuador's greatest Incan, archaeological remains, located 100 kilometers north of Cuenca, in southern Ecuador.   [...]

BY DAVID MORRILL Cuenca's Museo de las Culturas Aborigenes, or Museum of Aboriginal Culture, is not your typical roadside attraction. Despite the fact that it's relatively small and privately owned, many consider it one of Ecuador's best archeolog   [...]