October 12-13- A Climb up to the Watch tower of the Iglesia de La Basilica

I rarely mention anything highly personal on my BLOG but on Friday October 12th, a most wonderful event occurred! My great Grandbaby, Victoria Faith, came into this world at 8 lbs. Yes, I'm a GG ( Great Grandma). It will be a few months till I get to meet her but thanks to the internet I can see her often.

Now on to more normal BLOG news.

On Saturday we walked the 10 to 12 blocks to the giant church that we had seen and read about. We had heard that you could climb up the huge bell tower and get another excellent view of the city. The view of the Iglesia de La Basilica as we got closer.

                                It is a huge church, the largest in the Americas!
             http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bas%C3%ADlica_del_Voto_Nacional

It took us several walks around the bottom before we found the entrance to the tower  where we had to buy tickets- $2/person.
                      Some of the many intricate gargoyles along the paremeter.

For the more faint of heart or those not in shape to walk up the many many flights of stairs, there is an elevator available.
About half way up, there was a large gallery where you could watch the religous service presently underway.

 

The church had many many beautiful huge stained glass windows.

 

A few floors further there were some souvenir shops and a restaurant where we had a beer on our way back down.

 

 

 

 The rest of the way up was even trickier.

The last staircase to the top.

                                                     And our final objective!

 

 

The views from the top outdoor gallery were pretty incredible- 360 degrees of Quito.

 

 

And yet another thing crossed off my bucket list in Quito.