Famous cities

Although second to Guayaquil in population and economic clout, QUITO is the political and cultural hub of a highly centralized country, where power is wielded by an elite class of politicians, bankers and company directors, often from old, moneyed families. Far more conspicuous than these sharp-suited executives, though, are the city's eye-catching indígenas, who make up a large part of its population. Whereas most other Latin American capitals have been stamped with the faceless imprint of imported US culture, Quito is still a place where Quichua-speaking women queue for buses in traditional clothing with metres of beads strung tightly around their necks, and where it's not uncommon to see children carried on their mothers' backs in securely wrapped blankets, as they are in the rural sierra. All this makes for a somewhat exotic introduction to the country, though the proliferation of ragged shoeshine boys and desperate hawkers selling miracle products is a sobering reminder of the levels of poverty in the city, and its considerable social inequalities.
The key to orientation in Quito is to see the city as a long, narrow strip. At the southern end is the old town, focused on three large squares: the Plaza de la Independencia (also known as the Plaza Grande), Plaza San Francisco and Plaza Santo Domingo. The street grid around these squares comprises a small, compact urban core dominated to the south by the hill of El Panecillo (the Little Bread Roll), crowned by a large statue of the Virgen de Quito. Fanning north from old Quito towards the new town is a transitional stretch around Parque La Alameda, while the new town proper begins a few blocks further north at Parque El Ejido. Known by Quiteños simply as El Norte, the new town stretches all the way north to the airport, but the only parts you're likely to visit are the central areas of La Mariscal, just north of Parque El Ejido, where most accommodation and tourist facilities are located, the business district further north, around Parque La Carolina.