Cafe Cultura

Cafe Cultura is a beautiful villa-cum hotel in the Mariscal (backpacker tourist area, fun to walk around) with each room painted with different frescoes on the ceilings and walls, fireplaces in the public areas, and a really fabulous small restaurant. The staff here speak perfect English and will help you with anything. We booked a junior suite, and they had 2 vases of lillies, a small bottle of wine, and a small basket of fruit in our room when we arrived. It's a wonderfully romantic place to stay. ($99/night for the junior suite.)

Directions: Mariscal near the artisan market, on Robles between Juan Leon Mera & Reina Victoria

When we arrived in our 1st destination we decided to book in to a hotel with lots of luxury just to give us time to get adjusted. I think if we had been allocated a better room our stay would have been much more enjoyable. We were in the attic area of the property and found it noisy (you could hear the people in the next room talking, snoring etc!!) and therefore hard to sleep (people tend to leave Quito early on flights to the Galapagos and luggage being moved about at 4-5am is not good!) The food was very good (but pricey by Quito standards) and the menu had a good variety of choice. The lounge area was lovely to relax in with huge sofas and a roaring fire when the nights got cooler.

Unique Quality: The rooms are all individually decorated by artists and are quite unique (check out the web site which has picture of each of the rooms so you can choose). If you choose a room you would like to stay in make sure you specifically request it on booking. Make sure the room is in the downstairs back part of the hotel, we met a number of people who stayed and had no problems with noise.

Directions: Cafe Culture is a short distance away from "Gringo Landia".