Cuenca Soup Kitchen is one of our favorite charities in Ecuador. We have written about them before in our blog, and encourage others to help their main mission of providing food, clothing, and other necessities to Ecuadorians and refugees in need. They are currently serving 175 families, but there are 300 more on the waiting […]
Cuenca – Bienal and Urban Street Art
The Biennial is an international art event held worldwide every two years. It is held in 50 cities, including Venice, Havana, Singapore, Prague, Beijing, Sao Paulo, Barcelona, plus others. Due to Covid, the 15th Bienal de Cuenca was postponed from 2020 and instead runs from December 10, 2021 through February 28, 2022. This year’s Biennial […]
Cuenca – Pase del Niño Parade 2021
This year’s parade was like no other before it… and yet it was exactly the same. Read on to see why… In 1823, the Vicar of the Archdiocese of Cuenca took a doll of the baby Jesus to various Holy sites around the world. The pope blessed the doll when it went to Rome. This […]
Cuenca – Festival de Luces 2021
Every year, shortly after sunset on December 7, families gather in front of the Santo Domingo church, and light more than 5000 lanterns in honor of the Our Lady of the Rosary. This is the 88th anniversary of the coronation of the “Morencia Virgin of the Rosary” as the patron saint of Cuenca (our city) […]
Cuenca – Jazz Jam Session
Some consider Cuenca as the cultural capital of Ecuador, which is filled with art of all types. There are visual arts galleries, weavers, quality crafts, ceramics studios, and there are also a variety of music and theater venues available every week, all year long. You can hear blues, country, pop, classical, trova, jazz, traditional Latin […]
Cuenca – Thanksgiving 2021
Happy Thanksgiving to all of our family and friends. We’re thankful we were able to get together with others this year. We had several Thanksgiving invitations, and had to choose. In the end, we decided to go to two dinners, based on timing. Yes, we were stuffed on Thanksgiving and wished we had “stretchy pants”! […]
A Milestone: Burt Turns 70
70?? Really?? How did that happen?? I am now well inside the age called “Tercera Edad” or the “Third Phase” in Spanish. When we hit 65, we started to receive the benefits of being older in Ecuador, such as paying half price for transportation, special short lines at the bank, people on the bus offering […]
Cuenca New Year’s Eve 2019
Saying goodbye to the old year with fire destroying the negative aspects of the prior year is a traditional way of celebrating New Year’s Eve in Ecuador. This New Year’s Eve appeared to be “the year of the jumpers.” There must have been a Zhumir (a locally made strong alcohol drink) or Pilsner contest, as […]
Cuenca: The Traveling Child
This was our 6th year following the annual Christmas parade in Cuenca, and we wanted to show the annual parade from a different perspective. This year, Burt captured the parade from his drone at 150 feet above the gazebo at Parque Calderón, as seen above. Many visitors lined up along calle Simón Bolívar both inside […]
Photo Show Opening Dec 2018
Last night was the opening reception for Burt and Evelyn Johnson’s first photo exhibition in Cuenca, Ecuador, at the Miguel Illescas Gallery. It was called Ecuador y Más: Su tierra y su gente (the land and the people), and presented images from three photographers: Michael Hamilton, Burt Johnson and Evelyn Johnson. All three are retired […]