The bus seemed to take forever to get there but eventually we did. The place was a hilariously touristy affair, with lots of tacky gift shops, a museum of miniature Quito and Planetarium. Sadly the salsa music we had been promised in the book was replaced by a downright awful violin recital. We skipped all this and headed straight to the monument.
Here's the lady standing right on what we thought (and were told) was the genuine equator.
We got slightly carried away with some silly shots. This one took forever to get as I just can't keep still.
Clairy teetering on the equator. She nearly made herself hysterical posing for this one.
We soon decided we had to get out of this place, and we had heard that Museo Solar Inti Ñan just round the corner was much more interesting. It damn well was as well. It was a crazy outdoor garden of a museum with all kinds of equatorial experiments to be played with as well as various archeological and anthropological displays
As soon as we had arrived and begun our tour with a cheerful young Quitonian(?), the first thing they pointed out to us was that their museum was on the real equator as measured by GPS, not like the monument we had previously been at, that was almost 200m off. Sadly even normal mobile phones don't work in Equador so I had no chance of confirming this.
We were then taken round a number of hilarious and I would say fairly dubious experiments indicating the power of the equator! As the earth slightly bulges on the equator this in theory means there is less gravity, and we along with everyone else there joined in making ourselves look extremely foolish trying to push each other hands down on and off the equator line. Another of their claims was that it was easier to balance an egg on the head of a nail on the equator than off it. Clairy did actually manage to do this and won herself a genuine stamped certificate! I had no chance with my shaky-shaky hands. I was slightly disappointed in the name of science however that there seemed to be no control experiment off the equator!
Then came the moment I had been waiting for. The whirpool sink experiment. Sure enough, when the sink was placed directly above the equator line, there was no discernable whirpool and the leaves in the water didn't spin, but on the north side the water spun clockwise, and on the south it spun anti-clockwise! Unfortunately, we had already read that this shouldn't happen, because the Coriolis force, which is supposed to be responsible, actually has no effect on tiny bodies of water. I tried to figure out how they achieved it, but couldn't. Here's a picture of the sink used. I reckon it has something to do with the shape.
Later on I couldn't resist, so asked about it and they replied that they provoked the effect for the demonstration. Bloody Charlatans!
We were then shown round various houses reported to be recreations of indigenous dwellings. They were quite nicely done, but by this time we were rather giggly and couldn't resist a few daft pictures.
Possibly the most comical part came when our guide started describing the power of the guinea pig, before it became just a tasty snack to the local people. Apparently they were kept in the house to detect and absorb negative energy from the surroundings and people. This even went as far as to make them useful tools for medical diagnoses by Shamans. The guinea pig would be rubbed from head to toe very slowly over the patient. It would then be opened (her words...poor bugger), and any ailments within the person would apparently be mirrored inside the Guinea pig. This description combined with a question I proceeded to ask about checking the sex of the little things almost proved too much for Clair who had to go outside to stop herself from cracking up.
We were then shown a genuine shrunken head from an Amazonian tribe complete with tastefully drawn diagrams describing exactly how it was done (in case you wanted to try it at home maybe?). What a beauty!
Finally we got to try a genuine Amazonian blowpipe complete with possibly not so genuine native American style headdress. Clairy was sadly rubbish and could barely hold it up, let alone hit the cactus paddle target.
I however, got it on the first go and redeemed myself for the egg balancing charade. I was disappointed to say the least that they didn't give certificates for this great achievement!
A last look over this wacky but fun museum before we left.
And stunning Ecuadorian scenery as we walked back down the road.
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