ecuador the country.

Ecuador, home of the Galapagos Islands, home of LDU Quito, home to over 15 million people, and semester home to me.  

Ecuador gained independence from Spain and was recognized as an independent country in 1830.  Some of it's major cities include it's capital city, Quito, along with its largest city, Guayaquil, and its historic center, Cuenca.  Ecuador's President, Rafael Correa, has been in office since 2007.  

Ecuador contains three main geographic regions, along with an insular region in the Pacific Ocean, known as the Galapagos Islands.  The other three regions include the coast, the mountains or highlands, and the jungle, or Amazonia.  Because of such drastic differences in region throughout Ecuador, the climate varies by geographic region.  

One of the most surprising things I found out about Ecuador is that it uses the U.S. Dollar.  After the financial banking crisis at the turn of the century, Ecuador began to use the U.S. Dollar and the use of the sucre became nonexistent shortly afterward.  

Because of its great variety in climate and culture among regions, Ecuador is a country that is exciting to learn about and explore.