Another Visit to the Equator

There are so many interesting plants here! So many have beautiful flowers but awful thorns.


Here is a better view of the snake skins. I can´t get the whole anaconda one in the picture.

This time we were able to spend about 2 hours and take a tour, they have many displays on different tribes in Ecuador, including the tirbe that shrinks heads. I have several pictures of the process but will not post them as they are pretty graphic. Anyone who is interested can see them when we get home or I will send pictures to you personally. Notice the snake skins on the wall behind the statue. The really big one on top is an anaconda and the smaller one is a boa constrictor.


Intiñan, or way of the sun, the first name for the equator. Early inhabitants of the area understood the sun, earths orbit and the stars they even celebrated winter and summer solstice. We were also told that Quito is taken from a pre Inca word Quitsa To. It is the ancient Tsafiqui language of the Tsáchilas and means: Quitsa =middle and To= world. These early natives were pretty smart to figure that out.



This time I got a much better video of the water demonstration. It is in Spanish so I will explain. The first time he lets the water out of the tub it is on the equator and the water drains straight down, the next time the tub is about 10 feet to the south (sur) and the water drains with a clockwise twirl, and the last time the tub is 10 feet to the North (norte) and the water drains with a counter clockwise twirl. It is pretty neat to see. This is called the Coriolos effect and accounts for the direction that hurricains and typhoons turn.

Equator Water Demonstration: Which way does your water turn? from Brenda Yost on Vimeo.

We had three in our group that became "egg masters", they balanced the egg on the head of a nail. Sister Flake, Sister Reed and Dad all balanced the egg. Sorry I didn´t get a picture of Dad, I asked him to do it again so I could take a picture but he wouldn´t.


Sign as you enter the site of the GPS equator.


August 2011 NRT team at the equator.

August 5, 2011

After returning to Quito we took the team to the equator. For those who do not know there are two areas that are called the equator. Back in the 1700´s the French came to Quito to find the equator; with the instruments they had they actually did a pretty good job. Now with GPS technology the "real" equator is about 200 meters away from the one the French identified. The original site is much touristier and I got to finally visit it the next week with Sister Naylor and Sister Lopez (this will be another post). One thing I have wondered through, the natives had a temple built on the real equator, of course the Spanish destroyed it, but maybe the French could have just asked the natives, as they seemed to know exactly where it was. Seems their knowledge of the stars, earth, sun etc. was pretty right on. Maybe we need to be a little more open to learning from others even if we think they are more primitive or not as civilized.