Coastal Ecuador

Weather patterns, including rainfall that in some places exceeds even the levels of the Ecuadorian Amazon, combine with a varied topography to create unique ecological life zones on the coast. Flora and fauna in some areas are more typical of Colombia and Central America. Endemic animal species abound and tropical forests meet the crashing waves of the Pacific Ocean. The region inland from Borbón, along the Río Cayapas and within the Cotacachi-Cayapas Reserve, protects the least-disturbed tropical lowland rainforest in western Ecuador, which is home to species that exist only here. Heading south, the land along the coast is much drier, although pockets of the less-developed lowlands, just a bit inland, are covered with lush cloud forests, the result of thick coastal fog that inundates the land for many months each year. Here, magnificent birds, many of them endemic, prosper along with howler monkeys and the nocturnal kinkajou. On the southern stretches of the Ecuadorian coast...