Cuenca is known for its historical buildings and stunning architecture. Nothing portrays this more than the 52 cathedrals of Cuenca. (One for every Sunday of the year.) The cathedrals are everywhere you look in the historic section of Cuenca, you cannot walk a block without having a church or church steeple in view. I wish we would have had the time to tour each one but we did tour as many as we could. Most of the churches have 3 services a day with an open door policy.

In the town’s main square there are two cathedrals, the “old” church which began construction in 1557 (the year Cuenca was founded) is no longer used for services and the “new” cathedral which began construction in 1885, services are still held in the new cathedral each day.  The towers of the old cathedral were used by the Ecuadoran expedition team that was measuring the arcs/radius of the earth in 1736.  These early measurements of the Earth’s curvature on the Equator enabled the first accurate determination of the size of the Earth.

During our touring of the city cathedrals we discovered several coffee shops. The first one we entered smelled heavenly on the outside. The hostess was grinding beans so we had to go inside. We ordered coffee and Tod tasted his and  immediately added sugar. (Something he never does.) I tasted mine and made an executive decision. “This coffee is terribly weak and not very fresh,  lets go.” Tod looked at me like I was crazy so I reminded him, “Darling, life is too short to drink bad coffee!”

About 3 doors down we found a coffee shop where they made each cup fresh and asked if we wanted it strong! We loved it and it became our favorite coffee shop in Cuenca.