First stop this morning was Mercado La Carolina — a typical market in Quito, with stalls for various vendors selling fruit, vegetables, meat, fish, etc. As Third World markets go, this was one of the cleanest and most orderly that we have seen.
We encountered most of the typical staples, plus a number of fruits that are unique to this part of South America. The market was well stocked, and everything looked very fresh, but it was not very crowded with shoppers.
There was a large food court, where vendors were preparing and selling prepared meals. It seemed that there were more customers sitting and eating breakfast at 8:30 a.m. than there were people shopping for their groceries.
We then drove just outside of Quito to the suburb of San Antonio de Pichincha where we visited Museo Intiñan — a museum (yet another) about the indigenous people of Ecuador. However, we saw very little about the natives.
Just outside the museum grounds, we passed a large monument, “The Monument to the Equator.” This 100 foot-high stone pyramid was erected about 1979 to commemorate the French-Spanish Geodesic Mission of 1736, which established the position of the equator at this point.
Unfortunately, while the French did a pretty good job using 18th century technology, modern GPS and other measurements have established that they were about 240 meters off. The actual line happens to run through the grounds of the Museo Intiñan. So that’s what we learned about on our visit.
Our museum host took us to a spot where a line had been painted on the concrete. Here we had the obligatory photo, standing in two hemispheres at once.
He then began demonstrating all of the fantastic physical properties of the equator, such as draining water out of a tub with the water going straight down. He then moved the tub about eight feet north and repeated the experiment, watching the water circle the drain counter-clockwise. And finally, the same tub was moved to about eight feet south of the line and refilled, so that we could watch the water circle the drain clockwise.
There were other demonstrations, such as balancing a raw egg on the head of a nail, which we were told could only be done precisely on the equator. He had us all try, and only two in the group succeeded. The physician from Peoria and I both received certificates of achievement.
There were some others, such as having us walk the line like drunks walking for a state trooper, or holding our arms out straight, that were supposed to be much more difficult exactly at that point.
Some of this just doesn’t add up, of course. If it is that easy to demonstrate where the line is, why were the French 240 meters off? And there is all sorts of folklore about balancing eggs only at equinox or on Easter, etc. But it was at least entertaining.
At the end of the visit, we were briefly shown one indigenous dwelling made from forest materials and stocked with 19th century objects, and we saw a llama in a pen on the way out. I’m not entirely sure why it was there.
On the way back to the bus, we were met by a Tourist Police officer with a hand puppet who had the puppet tell us, in a squeaky voice, to be careful to avoid pickpockets and to always wear our Covid masks. It’s easy to be a ventriloquist while wearing a surgical mask — we never saw his lips move, because we never saw his lips. We thought it must be a really lousy assignment for a cop, and the poor guy was probably cursing every minute he had to stand there doing that.
The bus drove us a short distance to Casa de Agave. We got mixed messages on this one, hearing once that it was some sort of project to help women, and another time that it was an ecological group, and yet another message that it was a commercial distillery.
In any case, we learned more than we ever wanted to know about agave plants, how many species there are, how they grow, how they are harvested, their place in native culture, etc. There was even a demonstration of how volcanic rock causes us to feel certain energy, which didn’t quite fit the whole agave motif.
The tour was paused for us to be seated and served a very nice lunch, featuring some foods we’d not yet had. The dessert was especially good.
After lunch, the tour continued to a room with a bunch of stainless steel and a still that looked like something from a 1920s mountain moonshine operation. Here we were told about fermentation and distillation, and a girl in a lab coat (with help from one of our group members, who was also put in a lab coat) demonstrated for us that distilled agave liquor burns if you set a flame to it. She also demonstrated that it makes good hand sanitizer. We all got a squirt.
Finally, we were taken to another room where we had an elaborate tasting of agave products, leading up to the final, “award-winning agave spirit.” We were told several times that this was “agave spirit” and not tequila. However, we drank our little shot with salt on the back of our thumb and a slice of lime to follow up. It tasted a lot like tequila.
The bus dropped us at the Quito Botanical Gardens on the way, as others continued back to the hotel. It was very nice, with some very beautiful tropical orchids and other flowers and plants.
After we had gotten our fill of the gardens, we set out to walk back to the hotel. It was supposed to be a 30 minute walk, but Google Maps apparently doesn’t care if you’ve downloaded an offline map for central Quito. The map refused to load.
We had to ask directions three times. Two of the people we asked told us to take a taxi because it was too far. But even with getting a bit lost and adding several extra blocks, it was not much more of a walk than we do at home on a daily basis.
Ecuadorians must think Americans are too weak to walk.
Anyway, we made it back safely. We had a couple hours to rest before having to go for our Covid tests. Even though we had to be tested to enter Ecuador, another PCR test is required to go to the Galápagos Islands — which are a part of Ecuador.
Ecuador has mandatory vaccination, with something like 85 per cent of the population now fully vaccinated. We had to show our vaccine cards to get into everyplace we went today, even the vegetable market. Masks are mandatory, too. We learned today that, even if you are in your own car, driving by yourself, you can be pulled over and fined $110 for not having your mask on! And U.S. drivers can’t even put their phones down.
It was a nasal swab test that went WAY up and tickled the brain. It was much cheaper than the same test in the U.S., but we were charged up front. Results in 24 hours.
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