Our Quito family day out

​We were up at 5am to catch the earliest us from Mindo back to Quito as I was bursting to see mum and dad. Again, the fare was only $3.10USD pp so I urge anyone traveling to Ecuador to visit Mindo as it was a truly special place which I highly recommend.
As we didn’t have any WIFI at the bus station we could grab an Uber so a regular taxi to the historic old town where we were staying that night will cost $12USD. Luckily, as fate would have it both my mum and me booked 1km apart so as soon as we checked into our hostel for the night (which was a shit hole BTW- never spend $17USD on a hostel as you will get EXACTLY what you pay for). Mum and dad were staying at Hotel San Francisco, so we wandered over to meet them and my god, I would recommend staying here, the place is a palace, full of lush garden courtyard and panoramic views of the city as much as I was so stoked to see them, I couldn’t help but wish we were also staying there too.
Seeing my parents was truly fantastic. I was absolutely filled with joy and excitement even though we have been so under slept the past 3 weeks. I knew my dad has re-injured his shoulder after a bad motorbike accident last year but he was in a sling when we arrived - made by my super woman mum and he was clearly in more pain than we were led to believe. As our whole family are Marvel geeks minus my mum we felt the best way to spend the day was heading to see the Avengers: End Game…AGAIN! We would be seeing them in Galapagos in a few days anyway, so it was a clear winner of things to do!

​Getting our tickets, massive popcorn and far too much Coca-Cola we sat and immersed ourselves in 3 hours of action super hero tremendousness. After the movie which even mum enjoyed – it was definitely catch up and dinner time. Unfortunately, dad’s shoulder seemed to be getting worse, far more painful and it started to raise some alarm bells. We headed back to the old town and to the square near mum and dad’s hotel and tucked into a feast of seafood, pasta, salad and cocktails. It was honestly brilliant to see them.
Anyone who lives away from home will completely resonate when I say how important it is when you are able to see family you haven’t seen for ages. Especially your parents. When you live in the same town or city it is so easy to take them for granted but my advice to you is NEVER DO THIS. They are too important and special to be taken for granted and I honestly didn’t want the day to end…but it had to as we literally couldn’t keep our eyes open and the next day was Galapagos!