I lived in Cuenca for 6 months and did whatever I could not to shop at either Supermaxi or Coral and preferred to buy 95% of my items at the local Mercados. I found that my weekly grocery bill was usually around $25 by doing this. Cuenca is pretty noisy and most buildings are not sound proof. When I return in December 2023 I will look towards the suburbs of Cuenca. Great Video. The Tomebamba is a great river walk.
We certainly loved our morning walks along the river -- such a wonderful asset for the city. We quickly learned to sop at the mercados for much better quality and prices.
Cuenca is such a beautiful city, haven’t been there in a while but it’s definitely quite appealing. Also, if you haven’t had encebollado yet, definitely make sure to try some out, I’m always practically screaming that it’s Ecuador’s best dish lol, though it’s definitely best to try it in Portoviejo in my opinion. If you have any food suggestions though let me know. Hope you enjoy Ecuador and also get a chance to go around the coast too! 👏🏼
In fact, the coast was the very next stop on our trip! Just finished up a couple weeks in Olon and Ayampe and it was fantastic. A great way to end our time in Ecuador. 😊
It looks very nice and makes me think of Boulder. I really loved visiting Ecuador but struggled a bit with how reserved the people are. D and I ended up in Costa Rica and have been here now for almost four years. Have a great weekend!
I want to do the same thing you guys are doing but is so hard to part from some of the stuff that anchors you: family, house. I think in 2023 will finally do it:rent out my house, quit my job and start wandering.
been in Cuenca since last August... LOVE IT! started an e-commerce business in my retirement and work with dozens of artisans selling there products online. the people are great!! they are kind, loving, and helpful WELCOME!!
Wonderful! We could see that Cuenca has a very welcoming community for expats looking to make a home base and even start a business. Great to hear that you're loving it! 😊
Welcome to Cuenca! It took us a month traveling aroung Ecuador (sierra and costa) to settle in Cuenca. This is the best city to live a life. We are here for 10 months and we are not disapointed at all. Also check out market 10 de Agosto, it's cheap and high quality
I know this is counterintuitive but one low cost country for you would be the United States, Compared to Canada they are very cheap, except for spending a bit on airbnb, entertainment and groceries are pretty cheap
@@ShadyD365 I understand about restaurants because of the cost of labor But the US can be cheaper than Spain, especially if you plant to cook at home. Gas is cheap if you want to drive. I live in Houston and I can’t believe how cheap the US is, any sport is free. You can play tennis, soccer and baseball in any city for free, the courts are free. Groceries in the US are cheaper than my country of origin Albania. If you avoid the exotic, here it’s cheap.
I don't see signs of snow there... LOL... unlike Toronto Canada which is dismal and snowing today. So nice to see your new Air B n B --- the river walk looks amazing too.
Cuenca looks amazing so far. The Air B and B is perfect! I can’t wait to hear what you think at the end of the month. As you can tell by our channel name we always wonder if we should move wherever we visit too! We will have to visit Cuenca!
We spent six weeks in Cuenca in 2017. SOoo great to see the place again. Try to make it down to Villcabamba. You probably already know what I’m talking about. LOVE your videos!
Thanks for another great video. Your Air B and B looks amazing. Just want to make sure all is well with both of your kids! I only noticed one of the pups in the video..
Both pups are doing well! Jasper often makes more cameo appearances in our videos. As soon as the camera starts rolling, Huxley refuses to walk and often ends up being carried. Apparently he's a little camera shy! 😂
The crime stats for Ecuador are off the chart! I scratched it off the list for that reason. Anecdotes about having a safe trip are nice, but the statistics are abysmal.
We were also very concerned about the crime rate and for that reason only stayed a few days in Quito. Cuenca certainly felt much safer. Of course, we don't go out at night so that helps.
Great video. I just retired and am starting in Queretaro Mexico and get my residency there and then in 6 months I think Cuenca is next with a ride to San Bartolome to get a hand made guitar. Thank you for sharing I will enjoy following your travels.
I ve lived in Cuenca for 3 years and loving every minute of it..The weather is NOT mild most of the year but the beauty of the city all makes up for it
It seems we were there at a good time for weather...many of the days were hot and sunny, only a few days of rain. How great that you've made a home base there! 😊
Matt Makens, weather geek, utube, about every 6 wks to 2 monts gives laNina update. saying slowlymoving out. water slowly warming up. That will affect EC's weather. :-) warmer, less rain. lets hope enough for our beloved farmers.
Thank you for posting this video. I am very interested in your Airbnb as I am moving to Cuenca in March. I cannot find this place on the Airbnb website. How on earth did you find it? Would it be possible for you to post a link to it? Thank you so much.
Calle Large is a good street to be on, close to many of the good spots in the historic parts of Cuenca. Make sure you go up to Turi to get a good overview of the city from the south. You can catch a bus for Turi on Solano.
Merci beaucoup pour votre vidéo sur Cuenca. 🤗J'ai bien hâte de voir combien seront vos dépenses pour un mois dans cette ville. 🤑 J'ai entendu tellement de bonnes choses sur cette ville. Bon voyage! 💫
There are a number of requirements in order to import your dogs to Ecuador. Once we arrived we found it to be an extremely dog friendly country and we were able to take our pups into all the restaurants. However, you do need to keep an eye out for strays.
We stayed in this same building back in March. We were excited to see if you stayed in the same unit. You were in a different apartment but it looked awesome. You can see ours here if interested. Cuenca Ecuador Airbnb Tour, Pumapungo Museum Visit and Dinner at Capitan Restaurant! ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-7XXPO2c1bAY.html
That's amazing! Wasn't it a great building and with such a good location? We went for a walk along the river with our dogs every single morning. We didn't manage to get to Capitan for dinner so we'll have to peek at your video and see what we missed.
I’ve had the privilege to travel all over Ecuador. Cuenca is beautiful, safe, quiet, nice coffee shops, uses USD. It’s a bit too quiet for me. You can take a bus to Guayaquil and explore more but that city can be dangerous. Prostitution is also legal too.
You must fly your dogs a lot ? We are moving from the US and our first stop in Matagalpa, Nicaragua. My wife is Nicaraguan. We will need to fly our 3 senior dogs from Miami to Managua. Our babies have never been crated and are not small enough to fly in the cabin. This is the one thing we are really nervous about. Any advice or tips ?? Thx ! Oh and we do plan to make it to Cuenca for a few months.
We faced a very similar experience when we had to fly our senior dog from Canada to Singapore via cargo. It was a nerve wracking experience for all. I would strongly recommend to purchase the crates and begin training as soon as possible, ideally using a familiar blanket to make it into a safe space. We also trained our current dogs by playing games with treats using their carriers. They have now flown almost 20 flights and have become quite relaxed about it. You will also feel more confident if you are extremely familiar with all the dog export/import requirements or retain a pet broker to assist you (as we did for the flight to Singapore). We also have a little tip sheet for dog travel that might help as well bit.ly/3oF4OMc
that air bnb WAS beautiful!! that is like a solid, stone age style that would be very popular right now--i can just barely remember when that was very popular in the early 70s. ok, i'm gonna get y'alls names RIGHT one of these days!! . . .
Nice video! That river walk is beautiful. I'm curious why Americans continue to use Fahrenheit and miles even though they are in a country that uses metric?.. Which is pretty much 97% of the world population. Isn't this part of learning the culture and language of that country?!
Do you travel with your dog? Isn't it complicated to do that? I would like to take my dog with me for a few weeks visit, but it seemed like it was a great deal of trouble to do so and I am uneasy about transporting her in the aircraft hold.
We actually travel with two dogs...they're small enough to fly in the cabin of the plane with us. There is a lot of paperwork required to bring pets in and lot of South America countries so it's only something to consider if you are planning a long visit. We're in South America for six months.
Unfortunately we didn't end up getting to Vilacabamba. Even though we toured through many places in Ecuador over three months, we couldn't get to all the beautiful spots.
Ecuador has a lot of dog import/export requirements so it was a little more challenging than entering other countries. We were in Ecuador for a few months so it was worth the effort.
How much is yr Abnb for the month. So the prices in the grocery store were USD? How is that if the dollar isn't their currency. So you pay in dollars? Prices were comparable to what I pay here in the US.
Ecuador uses the USD. Those are Trader Joe prices on eggs and butter for EC, but many other items are much cheaper both in the grocery and at mercados.
We'll be sharing all our costs including Airbnb in our next video, coming out on Dec 25. And yes, Ecuador uses USD which is one of the reasons it's so popular with American expats and retirees. Agree that many of the items cost the same as at home, usually because they're specialty imports. Local produce is very inexpensive.
I live here in Mexico and can get a dozen eggs for $1.60 USD. A loaf of bread about $2.00 USD. A liter of milk for about a $1.00 USD. Much cheaper here than there or the U.S. I've rented a 2 bedroom furnished apartment within walking distance to the Zócalo for about $350 USD a month.
