Cuenca Tour: The Best of Cuenca Ecuador in 12-Video City Tour | Bryan Haines | GringosAbroad
Visiting Ecuador and looking for a great Cuenca tour? In this post, you’ll get to see the best of the city of Cuenca Ecuador in this 12-video tour of the city.
In this post, I’ve put together our 12 best videos for a great Cuenca driving tour. On this virtual Cuenca tour, you have two options:
Just sit back and watch. Start the video playlist below – and enjoy your 90 minute Cuenca tour.
Choose the area you want to see most. Below this video, you’ll see a list of the areas we’ve covered – and you can choose the video of the specific area you want to see most.
Ready to get started? Lets go – your Cuenca tour bus is now departing!
Cuenca City Tour (12 Video Playlist)
In this playlist, you’ll visit the most popular areas of the city. The first video is a time-lapse of a bus tour around Cuenca. Then we slow it down as we visit the main streets and neighborhoods in the city.
Watch on YouTube
Have a specific area in mind? Here are all the videos in the above playlist – organized by area.
Cuenca Tour: Street by City Street
To begin, lets take a time lapse bus trip around Cuenca.
Cuenca Bus Tour (Time lapse)
In this first video, we’ll take almost 2 hours of bus tour and compress it into 15 minutes. Here’s the original post with photos and backstory. See a sped up version in the second video.
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In this video, you’ll see the same Cuenca bus tour as above, but at double the speed. The 110 minute trip is compressed into less than 8 minutes.
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Tour of Baños in Cuenca Ecuador (Driving via a Baños)
On this drive, we start on Avenida de las Americas and travel the full length of via a Baños to the large blue church.
For many years, we lived at the foot of via a Baños and know it well. We’ve hiked extensively in the roads and hills above the blue church. There is a small produce market in front of the church on the weekends. The views from the parking lots are amazing.
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Tour of Avenida Remigio Crespo in Cuenca
Av. Remigio Crespo runs from Avenida de las Americas (at the Feria Libre), crosses Avenida Loja and continues to Avenida Solano (by the stadium).
Remigio Crespo runs through two parroquias (parishes): El Batán and Sucre.
There are many nice restaurants on the lower (Solano) end of Remigio Crespo. There are also a number of apartment towers, furniture stores and bike shops in this area. SRI (Ecuador’s national tax office – like the American IRS) is located here.
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Tour of Avenida Loja, Cuenca, Ecuador
Now we’ll tour the length of Avenida Loja in Cuenca, Ecuador. Starting at Avenida de las Americas and ending at Avenida 12 de Abril (runs parallel to the Tomebamba River).
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Tour of Gringolandia in Cuenca, Ecuador (Avendia Ordoñez Lazo)
Within walking distance of Gringolandia, you’ll find the Cuenca Orchidarium, an English-speaking dentist, and Plaza de las Americas – home of Supermaxi (1 of 3 in Cuenca) and SuKasa.
This area is close to both the city center and the airport. There are many stores nearby and there are nice walking trails along the Tomebamba River which runs parallel to the Avenue.
The majority of buildings in this area are security buildings and the area is known to be safe. After we were robbed, we moved to one of the apartment towers for a year.
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Visiting Supermaxi El Vergel in Cuenca
This is an area you’ll come to know well. There are a number of government offices, TV Cable (internet / cable provider), and Supermaxi. This video shows how to get to Supermaxi (El Vergel) and Parque de la Madre from Avenida Solano.
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Cuenca Tour: Driving to Mall del Rio
Mall del Rio is the largest shopping center in Cuenca, Ecuador. In this video, you’ll see how to drive there from the old city along Avenida Solano.
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Drive Avenida Don Bosco on Your Cuenca Tour
On this drive, we start at Tres Puentes (3 Bridges) on Avenida Solano and travel the full length of Avenida Don Bosco to Avenida de las Americas. This road runs almost parallel to Avenida Primero de Mayo.
Avenida Don Bosco is famous for its roast cuy and pork – sold right on the street. Read more about pork and cuy.
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Cuenca Tour of Avenida Primero de Mayo
On this drive, we start on Avenida de las Americas and travel down Primero de Mayo. On the left, is the Yanuncay River.
As we come to the end of the video, we arrive at the redondel tres puentes (Three Bridges Rotary) and turn right onto Avenida Don Bosco.
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Cuenca City Tour of Avendia 10 de Agosto, Parque Paraiso and Solca
On this drive we’ll start on Avenida del Paraiso by Solca (Cuenca’s famous cancer clinic) and pass Parque Paraiso. We travel the full length of the Avenue to Avenida Loja.
To the left of Avenida 10 de Agosto is the Yanuncay River. As we drive, we go through a number of redondels (traffic circles or roundabouts).
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Driving Tour of Avenida Solano, Cuenca
We begin on 12 de Abril (at the foot of the stairs heading to El Centro) and travel toward 3 Puentes. At the beginning of the Avenue, you’ll see the headquarters of Banco Pichincha.
Watch on YouTube
And there you have it. Our top 12 Cuenca tour videos.
How did we shoot these videos? These were all shot with a GoPro and Fat Gecko Suction Mount mounted to the inside of the windshield of our ’94 Trooper. The bus tour time lapse was shot with our GoPro mounted on the UltraClamp on top of a double-decker bus.
Walking Tour of Cuenca
While driving videos are great, they aren’t the same as having your feet on the ground. We created a half-day kid-friendly walking tour of Cuenca.
Your Turn
Have you taken a city tour of Cuenca? What’s your favorite area? Planning a trip? What area do you want to see most?
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