Well, we finally came to the realization that today was going to be the last day of our trip. We are sad to end such a great time, but we´re excited to come home and see all of you! Here´s our last South American post...
We spent our last 2 days here in Quito, the capital of Ecuador. Yesterday, we went up a cable car called the Teleferi to get some great views of Quito. Samantha Brown led us to believe there would be a flavored oxygen bar up there, but we were led astray. No such bar was there and we spent our time up at 4,100 meters oxygen deprived. The views were really good though, so we guess it was worth the trip.
Today we decided to end the trip by visiting the equator. Here in Ecuador, there is a huge monument called "Mitad del Mundo" surrounded by a whole little theme park about 22km outside the city of Quito. To the less savvy traveller, this would appear to be where the equator is, but not for us! We did our homework and found out that the actual equator (located using GPS) is a short walk away from the monument in a separate area called the Museo Solar Inti Ñan. 
At the real equator, we learned about the indigenous people of Ecuador and got to try our hand at their traditional hunting methods. Sue was a pro. We also got to do some cool things that you can only do at the equator. Chris learned that it is hard to walk a straight line on the equator with your eyes closed because of the centrifugal forces. No, he hadn´t been drinking. We all got the chance to try to balance an egg on the top of a nail and after some persistence, even Jen was able to do it (and earn her certificate!). We also saw one other cool experiment that shows how the water at the equator goes straight down the drain while either north or south (even by only a few feet) it will drain either clockwise or counterclockwise. The real equator was way cooler than the fake one five minutes away.
We hope that you have enjoyed reading our South American blog and we hope that you all tune back in for the New Zealand installment scheduled to start in early January. See you all soon!
5 comments:
We are really looking forward to seeing you tomorrow, but, I have to admit, we will miss Tom.
Safe trip.
Do you have to wear the hat to hunt like an Ecuadorian? Does it increase blow-dart speed or something?
It absolutely increases blow-dart speed! There's no way I could have hunted that cactus (which was our practice target) without it.
more boobies please!
What were the bars like on the galapagos isles? They are probable off the chain.
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