Photo: Charles J. Sharp (CC BY-SA 3.0) via Wikimedia Commons

The Ecuador honeymoon: islands first, cloudforest last

A honeymoon here works when the trip ends somewhere quiet instead of somewhere logistical. Most couples fly home through Quito and lose the last two days to airport hotels; our version ends in the Mindo cloudforest, where the air is cool and the biggest decision is which hammock. The itinerary below runs 10-12 days: five to seven in the islands, then two or three at our hotel, Las Terrazas de Dana, in Mindo. The honeymoon planning guide covers the mindset; this page is the day-by-day.

Days 1-2: Quito arrival, slow start

• Land, sleep at altitude (2,850 m), and give yourselves a day: the old town’s churches, a rooftop dinner, the TelefériQo if the sky is clear.
• Buy the TCT ($20) online or at the airport counter; keep $200 per adult ready for the park fee (entry fee details).
• Book the best small boats early: honeymoon weeks are not the weeks that find last-minute cabins. See how the cruise market works before you commit.

Days 3-7: Galápagos, your version

Pick the shape by taste, and honestly, both are right:

• Cruise version (5 days/4 nights): wake up at a new island daily, dinner on deck, zero logistics. Small yachts of around 16 guests feel private even full; the western islands are the wildest scenery.
• Land version (our boutique favourite): Santa Cruz then Isabela. Tortuga Bay’s lagoon in the morning, the Charles Darwin Research Station’s quiet paths, the highlands ranch lunch among wild tortoises, then the ferry to Isabela for the sand-street town where Los Túneles gives you the trip’s best shared swim: arches, seahorses, whitetip sharks, and often nobody else in the water.

Ferries run twice daily ($50 per leg for tourists; timetables here), and Isabela pays its $10 local fee at the pier. The 7-day land itinerary is the logistics skeleton if you go hotel-based.

The days couples remember

From a decade of sending couples:

• Snorkelling together at Kicker Rock or Los Túneles: sharks below, turtles alongside, and it is just the two of you and the guide in the frame.
• Sunset on Puerto Villamil’s beach, the longest sand in the archipelago, crowds thinning to nothing.
• A kayak at first light through Tortuga Bay’s mangroves, engines off.
• Dinner in Puerto Ayora or Baquerizo with the day’s catch on the board.

Days 8-10: The Mindo finish

Here is the part we are qualified to be opinionated about, because it is our home. Fly back to the mainland and skip the Quito layover entirely: two hours from the capital, the cloudforest is waterfalls, hummingbirds and chocolate, and nothing is scheduled.

• Day 8: private transfer Quito → Mindo (about 2 hours; about $105 with a trusted private driver), check in at Las Terrazas de Dana, first forest walk at dusk.
• Day 9: birding at first light (hummingbirds by the dozen; the cock-of-the-rock if you rise early), chocolate-making in town, the butterfly farm, and an afternoon with no plan at all. This is the decompression the week of salt and boats owes you.
• Day 10: morning mist from the deck, transfer to Quito, fly home in the evening or sleep at an airport hotel and fly the next morning.

Couples who add this chapter end the trip rested instead of wrung out, and the flight home leaves from Quito either way. The full 10-day version of this itinerary runs cloudforest first; the honeymoon version runs it last, for a reason we explain there (altitude, energy, ending on the high).

Budget and booking notes

Per person excluding international flights: Galápagos fixed costs $450-620, boats by class (cruise pricing explained), boutique island hotels and the Mindo nights at the top of their class (check current rates with us). Two booking rules that matter for two: reserve the small boats and the Mindo rooms for dry-season dates months ahead, and book the Mindo nights with the islands as one itinerary, that is exactly what we do, Galapagos Dana Tours in the islands, Las Terrazas de Dana in the cloudforest.

Last verified: September 2026