Ecuador: Ten Attractions and Natural Wonders

A small country of huge variety

Ecuador is one of the smallest countries in South America, but it packs in the Pacific coast, the Andes (a double row of them, with a valley of volcanoes between), the western Amazon, and — 900 kilometres offshore — the Galápagos. It straddles the equator, which gives it its name, and it has more biodiversity per square kilometre than almost anywhere. It is also compact and cheap to travel, on a dollarised economy.

The ten below run down the Andean spine, with the Galápagos as the great outlier. There are no real seasons on the equator, just wetter and drier months that vary by region; the highlands are cool year-round.

1. The Galápagos Islands

The Galápagos, a volcanic archipelago straddling the equator, are the most famous wildlife destination on Earth — the islands where the mix of isolation and different conditions produced giant tortoises, marine iguanas, flightless cormorants, and Darwin's finches, and where, on the Beagle voyage, Charles Darwin gathered the observations behind natural selection. Animals here are almost absurdly tame.

You visit on a live-aboard cruise or by staying on Santa Cruz, San Cristóbal, or Isabela and doing day trips. It is a national park and a UNESCO World Heritage Site, with strict rules, guides, and fees.

2. Quito

Ecuador's capital sits in a narrow Andean valley at 2,850 metres, hemmed by volcanoes. Its historic centre — the first site, with Kraków, ever inscribed by UNESCO — is a tight grid of whitewashed houses, cobbled streets, and a extraordinary density of churches, the gilded interior of La Compañía among the most lavish in the Americas. Climb the neo-Gothic Basílica del Voto Nacional, or take the cable car up Pichincha for the view.

The equator monuments at Mitad del Mundo are half an hour north.

3. Cotopaxi and the Avenue of the Volcanoes

The valley running south from Quito is lined with snow-capped volcanoes — the 19th-century explorer Alexander von Humboldt called it the "Avenue of the Volcanoes". Its centrepiece is Cotopaxi, a symmetrical glacier-clad cone in a national park of windswept páramo grassland roamed by wild horses. You can drive to a car park at 4,600 metres and walk up to the climbers' refuge at 4,864, or mountain-bike back down; the summit is a serious glacier climb.

Cotopaxi is genuinely active — it erupted as recently as 2015 and 2022–23 — and access can be restricted.

4. Quilotoa

Quilotoa is a three-kilometre-wide caldera, formed by a catastrophic eruption about 800 years ago and now filled by a lake whose dissolved minerals turn it green, blue, or turquoise depending on the light. A steep path drops from the rim village to the shore (about 30 minutes down, an hour or more back, or by hired mule), where you can kayak.

The lake is the highlight of the "Quilotoa Loop", a multi-day village-to-village hike through Andean farmland and páramo, one of the best treks in the country.

5. Otavalo market

Two hours north of Quito, Otavalo has one of the largest and oldest Indigenous markets in South America. The Kichwa-speaking Otavaleños have been renowned weavers and traders for centuries — you'll see their ponchos, blankets, and scarves sold worldwide — and on Saturdays the market swells to fill much of the town, with a separate, chaotic livestock market at dawn on the edge of it.

Around Otavalo: the Peguche waterfall, the crater lakes of Cuicocha and Mojanda, and the leather town of Cotacachi.

6. Mitad del Mundo (the equator)

Just north of Quito, the "Middle of the World" complex has a 30-metre monument and a painted line where an 18th-century French geodesic mission calculated the equator to run — a chance to stand with a foot in each hemisphere and buy a stamped certificate. GPS has since shown the true line to be a couple of hundred metres away, at the smaller, quirkier Intiñan museum next door, where guides demonstrate water swirling in opposite directions and eggs balancing on nails.

It is touristy and good fun, an easy half-day from the capital.

7. Baños

Baños de Agua Santa, on the eastern slope of the Andes where the mountains drop toward the Amazon, is Ecuador's adventure-sports town: rafting, canyoning, bridge jumps, and the "Ruta de las Cascadas", a road (cycled, or ridden in an open chiva bus) past a series of waterfalls, ending at the thundering Pailón del Diablo. The town sits below the active Tungurahua volcano and has thermal baths fed by it, and the famous "swing at the end of the world".

8. The Devil's Nose railway

The Guayaquil–Quito railway, an extraordinary feat of early-1900s engineering (and one that cost many lives), includes the Nariz del Diablo, a near-vertical mountainside descended by a zigzag of switchbacks where the train reverses to lose height. A short tourist ride runs the switchbacks from Alausí when the line is operating — Ecuador's train network has been repeatedly suspended and revived, so check the current status.

Even without the train, the viewpoint over the switchbacks is dramatic.

9. Chimborazo

Chimborazo, an extinct volcano in the central Andes, is Ecuador's highest peak — and, because the Earth bulges at the equator, its summit is the point on the planet's surface farthest from the centre, and the closest to outer space. Its lower slopes are a wildlife reserve where herds of vicuña graze the páramo, with a road to a car park at 4,800 metres and a walk to the climbers' refuges above.

The summit is a demanding glacier climb; the reserve and the first refuge are open to anyone acclimatised.

10. Cuenca

Cuenca, in the southern Andes, is often called Ecuador's most beautiful city — a UNESCO World Heritage Site of cobbled streets, red-tiled roofs, riverside walks, and the blue-domed "new" cathedral. It is a centre of craft (ceramics, jewellery, and the misnamed "Panama" hat, which is actually Ecuadorian and woven near here) and has drawn a large community of North American retirees.

Nearby are the Inca and Cañari ruins of Ingapirca — the largest in Ecuador — and the páramo lakes of Cajas National Park.

Ecuador is small and easy: a week of highlands from Quito covers Cotopaxi, Quilotoa, Otavalo, Baños, and Cuenca, with the Amazon a short flight east. The Galápagos are a separate trip of at least four or five days, usually added on.