"Ecuador,
so tiny on the map of
the world, has always
possessed the grandeur
of a great country to
those who know her well."
- Albert B. Franklin,
Ecuador: Portrait of a
People
Sitting on the
equator between Colombia
and Peru, Ecuador
is the smallest of the
Andean nations, covering
an area no bigger than
Nevada. For all its
diminutive size, however,
the country is packed
with the most startling
contrasts of scenery,
taking in steaming
tropical rainforests,
windswept highlands,
ice-capped volcanoes and
palm-fringed beaches,
all within easy reach of
the capital, Quito. It's
a land of bold contours
and heightened colours,
where you can find
yourself beneath a
canopy of dripping
vegetation amongst
clouds of neon-coloured
butterflies one day, and
in a highland market,
mixing with scarlet-ponchoed
indígenas the
next. It's also a
country of astounding
biodiversity, boasting
1600 species of bird
(more per area than any
other South American
country), 4500 species
of butterfly and over
3500 species of orchid,
to cite just a few
examples. Add to this
the country's stunning
colonial architecture
and diverse indigenous
groups, and it becomes
clear why Ecuador is
regarded by many as a
sort of South America in
miniature, offering a
pocket-sized microcosm
of almost everything
travellers hope to find
on this bewitching
continent. As if more
were called for, its
attractions are
triumphantly capped off
by the Galápagos Islands,
whose extraordinary
wildlife has gone down
in history for its
pivotal role in shaping
Charles Darwin's
theories on evolution.
Geographically,
Ecuador's mainland
divides neatly into
three distinct regions
running the length of
the country in parallel
strips. In the middle is
the sierra ,
formed by the eastern
and western chains of
the Andes that surge
abruptly into the clouds
from the lowlands either
side. Punctuated by over
thirty volcanoes, the
two chains are joined by
a series of high
plateaux at around 2800m
above sea level,
separated by gentle
transverse ridges, or
nudos ("knots" of
hills). This is the
agricultural and
indigenous heartland of
Ecuador, a region of
patchwork fields
crawling up the
mountainsides, of
stately haciendas and
dozens of remote
communities. The sierra
is also home to many of
the country's oldest and
most important cities,
including Quito. East of
the sierra is the
Oriente , a large,
sparsely populated area
extending into the upper
Amazon basin, much of it
covered by dense
tropical rainforest - an
exhilarating, exotic
region, though under
increasing threat from
oil-production and
colonization. West of
the sierra, the
coastal region is
formed by a fertile
alluvial plain, used for
growing tropical crops
such as bananas, sugar,
coffee and cacao, and
bordered on its Pacific
seaboard by a string of
beaches, mangrove swamps,
shrimp farms and ports.
Almost a thousand
kilometres of ocean
separate the coastline
from the Galápagos
archipelago, annexed by
Ecuador in 1832.
All this provides a
home to some fourteen
million people, the
majority of whom live on
the coast and in the
sierra. They are
descendants, for the
most part, of the
various indigenous
populations that
first inhabited
Ecuador's territory, of
the Incas who
colonized these lands in
the late fifteenth
century, of the
Spaniards who
conquered the Inca
empire in the 1530s and
of the African slaves
brought by the Spanish
colonists. Although the
mixing of blood over
many centuries has
resulted in a largely
mestizo (mixed)
population, the
indigenous component
remains very strong,
particularly among the
Quichua-speaking
communities of the rural
sierra, and the various
ethnic groups of the
Oriente such as the
Shuar, the Achuar, the
Huaorani and Secoya,
while on the north coast
there's a significant
black population. As in
many parts of Latin
America, social and
economic divisions
between indígenas
, blacks, mestizos
and an elite class of
whites remain deeply
entrenched, exacerbated
here by a slew of recent
economic and political
crises. And yet, even as
poverty and unemployment
increase, as their
national currency is
lost to the US dollar
and their political
leaders continually fail
to tackle the country's
problems, the
overwhelming majority of
Ecuadorians remain
resilient, remarkably
cheerful, and extremely
courteous and welcoming
towards visitors.
