Part IV: Ecuador's Food

One day at the market. People there eat a lot of plantain (Kochbanane), cheese, rice, meat and eggs.

 This was in a supermarket...hm i guess they have never heard of happy chickens

 Ecuador has soooo many fruits I have never tasted before.P eople drink a lot of fresh-made juice there. Yum!

 a bizarre sight...

 awesome fruits

 Fig with Cheese (it was okay!), the pot of figs somehow looks like mussels to me...

 Self-Made Christmas cake on a wonderful blue tablecloth.

well that's it from Ecuador. :) Stay tuned for more pics!

Part III: People of Ecuador

The shaman in the jungle performing dark arts ;)

*yes, I need a better lens for portrait pictures :(

Part II: Ecuador's Cities and Markets

Otavalo's colorful market:

In Otavalo you can purchase all sorts of textiles. This place is especially known for the Indians' beautiful and colorful handcrafts.

Baños:
Baños lies at the foot of an active volcano. It is a fun place to go, as you can go rafting, horse back riding or start your jungle tour from here.

Cuenca:
Cuenca is a beautiful city with lots of markets, a very blue sky(!) and beautiful architecture. Cuenca is known for its superb panama hats (yes, they are called panama hats, but they are originally from Ecuador!)

Other glimpse on cities:

Part I: Ecuador's diverse nature...

The corresponding blog post will follow soon, but here some pictures from Ecuador. 
In sum, this country is very fortunate to be rich and diverse in nature as you will see in the following pictures. I would definitely recommend it to everyone who has an affinity to nature! Just look how BLUE the sky is there!

At the Pasachoa Volcano

Highlands (Cuenca)

 Jungle in Tena

 Coastline

At the beach

Flying Smartly

So during this year I have been asked by many people how I could afford to travel so much all over the world - well this post will hopefully give some simple answers:

Workshops, conferences, business-related trips

I often find workshops, conferences or other business-related trips to which I apply or get invited to, so I do not pay for the flights/trips. This helped me to get to Torino, Zurich, London, Paris, Berlin and other cities. After or before attending the event I would try to see something from the city or even visit some friends in the respective city. 

You should always try to make some free time to actually visit the city besides the actual purpose of the trip. Now I know that not everyone has the chance to just attend these kind of events, but look on the Internet, I am sure that you will find events that 1) are interesting for you and 2) to which you can also apply to and which are on top of it in very cool cities - try and apply, you have nothing to lose!

Scholarships

The second answer I can give is that I was often supported by scholarships that have helped me to pay for bigger trips. I am very thankful for the support. So if you consider doing an internship abroad I would definitely advice you to look for scholarships and mobility scholarships on the Internet. There are a lot of institutions that support stays abroad and internships abroad. - If you need help, email me.

Booking cheap flights and using clever transit

Of course I also rely on cheap flights and train tickets. 

I am still confused how all the airlines and webpages calculate their prices, but I have noticed that flight prices are mostly down during the morning (5-7 am), so I found flights from Germany to New York for around 340€ for 2 weeks from now - which is pretty short notice. 

I would also recommend to check and compare flights in the local currency (e.g. Euro vs. Dollar in that example) and the current exchange rates.

Also make sure to check local flight companies for inner flights as they will be certainly much cheaper!

If I found a cheap flight with a transit, I would make sure that 1. it is via a very cool city and 2. if it's a cool city, try to stay in that city as long as possible.

That is what one of my friend did when we flew to Shanghai. We had to stop in Dubai and he had 10 hours to kill before his flight from Dubai to Shanghai, so he took a cab and discovered Dubai - for no additional flight costs :) So all in all he got to see Dubai and Shanghai for around 500€.

I know this can be very stressful and is probably not something everyone wants to do. But if you want to use every occasion and you don't have the budget to travel all the time for >1000€ - this might be a good option for you.

If you need more tips or more information on the points above, feel free to email me.

So for me the next stop will be Ecuador for four weeks during the Christmas break and using the above I will spend another two days in Miami as I will fly over Miami) and I only paid 550€ YEAH! :) 

some random pics :)

by Sisi