Did the Incas explore the Pacific?

There has long been evidence, most of it barely investigated, that Andean peoples and Polynesian peoples have had contact various times in their pre-Columbian pasts. It has even been suggested that people arrived in South America from Polynesia – evidence of human activity in Chile from a time before humans were supposed to have crossed the Bearing Straits has been found.

August 15, 2008 | Archaeology, History

5 Comments

Ecuador: Mitad del Mundo

0° latitude – the equator – just north of the city of Quito

We went to see the equator and the monument that sits on it. It was here that the equatorial line was calculated by Frenchman Charles-Marie de la Condamine in 1736. It’s actually 150m off the actual equator as measured by modern GPS instruments – themselves often 7-10 meters off.

January 30, 2007 | Beyond Peru

No Comments

Ecuador: Quito’s Pickpockets

This was maybe the first criminal act targeted towards me in all my months in living South America.

Annett and I had left the internet cafe where we had been working on a project, it was perhaps 9 or 10pm and we had found El Rey’s Sandwiches, a small sandwich shop that sells $1 hot dogs amongst the dozens of bars and clubs in La Mariscal – a tourists haven in the day and party center for Quiteños and tourists at night.

January 30, 2007 | Beyond Peru

No Comments

Ecuador: Quito, the old city

We walked from the new city to the old city to save on a $3 taxi ride, it took about 20 minutes. The old city, which spans out around the Plaza de la Independencia has buildings dating back hundreds of years. West of this plaza is another, Plaza de San Francisco that contains the Presidential Palace.

January 29, 2007 | Beyond Peru

No Comments

Ecuador: Quito, the new city

We spent the first day in Quito using the local internet cafe for work purposes and not leaving the new city. Quito is said to be a city of two cities – the colonial old city in the south and the new city sprawling out to the north, not much more than a half century old.
Most of the tourist stuff is in La Mariscal in the new city and thats where we based until we were able to see the rest of the city.

January 19, 2007 | Beyond Peru

No Comments