When one of the world’s most respected travel magazines dedicates an entire guide to Ecuador, the world pays attention. The Wanderlust Explorer’s Guide to Ecuador & the Galápagos Islands is exactly that — a publication that journeys through the four worlds of the most biodiverse country per square kilometer on the planet. And among the best luxury hotels in Ecuador that Wanderlust highlighted, three belong to Metropolitan Touring: Mashpi Lodge, Casa Gangotena, and Finch Bay Galápagos Hotel. Not as advertising. As part of the story.
Why a Wanderlust Mention Matters
Wanderlust is not just any travel magazine. Founded in 1993 after a life-changing trip to Ecuador — yes, to Ecuador — it is the longest-running independent travel publication in the United Kingdom. Its readers are not looking for hotels. They are looking for experiences that change the way they see the world. That is why when Wanderlust recommends a place, it does so with the weight of three decades of editorial credibility behind it.
This special guide dedicated to Ecuador and the Galápagos Islands is not a sponsored supplement. It is a declaration that Ecuador remains one of the most extraordinary destinations on the planet — and that some of its finest hotels have stories worth telling and exploring.
Mashpi Lodge: Where Luxury and Science Live Under the Same Roof
If there is one place in Ecuador that embodies the idea that luxury and conservation can truly coexist, that place is Mashpi Lodge.
Wanderlust features it in its curated Andes accommodation section with a distinction few properties ever receive: a bucket-list experience. That is not empty praise. It is the recognition that a stay at Mashpi is unlike any other night in any other hotel.
The lodge sits at the heart of a private 3,000-acre reserve in the primary cloud forest of the western Andes. Its glass walls are not simply a design choice — they are a statement of intent. Here, the outside world is not a view. It is the main character. Automated blinds regulate the light of dawn so that every morning becomes a spectacle, and the Dragonfly cable car lifts guests above the forest canopy as a constant reminder of exactly where they are.
But what makes Mashpi truly singular is not found in its architecture. It lives outside it—1,700 species recorded within the reserve. Ten of them were found nowhere else on Earth. Naturalist guides who lead night walks in search of the famous glass frog, snakes, spiders, and the many creatures that hide within this ecosystem after dark—a team of resident scientists whose work continues long after guests turn off the light.
Wanderlust goes further. In a separate editorial interview with Lucas Bustamante — an Ecuadorian biologist and one of Latin America’s most celebrated conservation photographers — the magazine reports on something few properties can claim: a new species was discovered at Mashpi. The Mashpi torrent frog, named in honor of the community that protects the reserve, is today a living symbol of what happens when tourism chooses to stand with nature rather than displace it.
Casa Gangotena: the Historic Heart of Quito
Quito holds 10,000 years of human history—the best-preserved historic center in Latin America. Baroque churches were built upon Inca temples. Markets that still smell of cacao and cedar. And an energy that blends the ancestral with the contemporary in a way no other Latin American capital quite manages.
Wanderlust dedicates several pages to the city — a clear signal that for the magazine, Quito is not simply a stopover on the way to the Galápagos. It is a destination in its own right.
And when the time comes to recommend where to stay, Casa Gangotena makes the curated Andes accommodation list.
The hotel occupies a historic mansion overlooking Plaza San Francisco — the oldest square in South America — in the heart of the UNESCO World Heritage-listed colonial center. Its Art Déco salons, Andean rooftop terrace, and cuisine that reinterprets Ecuadorian flavors through a contemporary lens make it something far greater than a place to sleep. It is a way of inhabiting the city’s history.
Finch Bay Galápagos Hotel: the Only Hotel with its Own Voice on the Islands
The Galápagos Islands need no introduction. The archipelago that forever changed the way we understand life on Earth. The place where marine iguanas do not move when you walk past them, because in four million years, they have never needed to fear anything. The destination where nature still holds the reins.
In this context, Wanderlust made an editorial decision that speaks volumes: across the entire Galápagos section, the only hotel given its own human story is Finch Bay.
The magazine interviews Ana Moya, a member of the Finch Bay Galápagos Hotel team, and makes her the voice of a chapter. Her story — how she left Quito to move to Santa Cruz, how she found her place within the Galapagueño community, what it means to work at the only beachfront hotel in the archipelago — is precisely the kind of narrative Wanderlust reserves for what genuinely matters to it.
In a destination where conservation is not a marketing argument but a condition of existence — where 97% of the territory is a national park and visitor regulations are among the strictest in the world — Finch Bay not only meets those standards, it actively contributes to them.
Three hotels. Three worlds. One conviction.
That Mashpi Lodge, Casa Gangotena, and Finch Bay appear across three of the four geographic sections of this guide is not the result of a public relations campaign. It is the result of decades spent building hotels that have something genuine to offer: ecosystems worth protecting, stories worth hearing, and experiences worth the journey.
Wanderlust was born from a trip to Ecuador over 30 years ago. This guide is, in many ways, a return to those origins — a reaffirmation that Ecuador remains one of the most extraordinary destinations on the planet. And Metropolitan Touring is at the heart of that story.
Because in the end, the best luxury hotels in Ecuador are not the ones with the most stars. They are the ones with the most history.
