Travel to Ecuador #1
It turns out that I will be traveling to Ecuador.
Hello my fellow chocolate lovers,
I am Takanori Chiwata, the chocolate engineer of COCONAMA CHOCOLATE.
Starting from today, I would like to share about the Ecuador trip I had the chance to go the other day. I would like to make these posts like my travel journal, so excuse my broken English!
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It turns out that I will be traveling to Ecuador in June.
Thanks to my work and common sense,I have an idea of where it is. It is in South America.
Non-Brazilian countries in South America means that it is a Spanish speaking country.
Finally, the country should be a Tropic region, since the name “Ecuador” originated from “Equator”.
The country looks like this:
Well, what else?
The capital? The currency? Other countries around it?
….It seems like I know nothing about Ecuador.
After looking into Ecuador, I came to understand that it is quite a unique country.
To begin with, one of our destinations: Quito, Ecuador. It is actually a Plateau region. Over 200,0000 people live in a highland between the elevation of 2500m~3000m. It is hard for me, since I have an experience of living in Japan, to imagine for a town to exist on an elevation high as Mt.Fuji.
Although the Ecuador is in the Tropics, This Plateau region is always between the temperatures of 10 °C~20 °C. Considering it’s a Tropical country, it feels bizarre to know it’s colder than Canada.
Our other destination Guayaquil is a port city in Ecuador, and basically it’s zero meters above sea level. Ecuador is located right below the Equator, so no surprise that Guayaquil gets crazy hot with the combination of those two factors. The average temperature in June is 35 °C, and it’s common to go over 40 °C during the summer.
Since we have other plans we won’t be able to go, but also the famous paradise for animals: Galápagos Island. Ecuador turned out to be an interesting Tropic country full of geographical shifts.
It looks like the currency is USD, but why not have their own currency? Looking at Europe in the recent years, it seems better off to have their own national currency… This actually may be an interesting question to ask the local people.
It looks like we don’t need any visa. As expected of Japan. You go the almighty passport!
Oh, can’t forget about disease prevention. Whenever traveling to South America, you must get vaccinated.We did get vaccinated 2 years ago when we traveled to Guatemala, so we should be alright…However, they all say “better safe than sorry” so off we go to the travel clinic.
As I thought, the vaccination we got 2 years ago should cover us for this trip as well (you know…lesser expense the better). The only thing I got warned about was the AMS and he recommended me to take Tylenol.
As I closed the casual talk with my doctor, I paid for the fees and went out of the clinic (For your info, travel clinic doesn’t get covered by the insurance).
We’ve decided where to go, and the purpose of this trip if the cacao beans.
“Wait what about the cacao beans?”
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Let’s call it a day now. I am hoping to see you all on our next post.
With hopes that you will be able to encounter the perfect chocolate just for you,
Takanori Chiwata
