Latitude 0 degrees, La Mitad del mundo, a geodesic mission.

Ecuador, English, ilse, Quito, reisverslag, toerisme

Sunday, April 3rd, La Mitad del mundo. We arrived on the equator around 10.30 AM and hardly any tourist was there. It was cloudy but no rain. Zero degrees latitude is the line designating the Equator and divides the Earth into two equal hemispheres (north and south) as defined by Wikipedia. Gent latitude is 51.0543° N. I never used to care about latitude and longitude but now that we are sailing we have to record the position of the boat in our log book and so when we left Panama I could follow how we were slowly but surely creeping to the zero degrees latitude. I remember we crossed the equator at 4.19 AM (do not remember the day and I have the logbook not at hand)on my shift, the sea was flat as a lake and it was a little foggy, it was an eerie feeling and we were only crossing an imaginary line.

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Low clouds over the surrounding mountains.
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0 latitude was first measured in 1736 on a geodesic mission to the equator. The mission was lead by the French (together with Spanish) who left in May 1735 and arrived in Ecuador in June 1736! They completed the measurements in 1739. They were real adventurers and incredible scientists.
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The method used to measure the circumference of the earth at the equator is triangulation. Triangulation is a surveying technique in which a region is divided into a series of triangles based on a line of known length so that accurate measurements of distances and directions may be made with trigonometry. If you ever wondered what cosinus and sinus were used for…

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After enjoying the different pavillions we enjoyed the performance of some folk dances in traditional clothing.

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Traditional folk dancing.

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We had fun watching and listening to the Andean tunes.

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het indrukwekkende hoofdkwartier van UnaSur
Right next to the village are the headquarters of the UNASUR, Unión de Naciones Suramericanas, unifying 12 countries.
De eerste voorzitter van de unie van de zuid amerikaanse naties
Former Argentine President Néstor Kirchner was unanimously elected the first Secretary General of UNASUR for a two-year term.
Namaak ijsje, een soort van schuim
Stefan had to try one of these sweets, no ice-cream but a kind of marshmallowy substance.
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We visited also a small museum next to the village, Museo Solar Inti Nan, which is more exactly situated on the equator. We had fun and it was a perfect way to end our visit.

Although very touristy we really enjoyed our day at La Mitad del mundo !

 

Eén reactie op “Latitude 0 degrees, La Mitad del mundo, a geodesic mission.”

  1. Hey Ilse en Stefan,

    Prachtige foto en super om telkens opnieuw jullie verslagen te kunnen lezen. De foto’s en verhalen laten ons elke keer een beetje meedromen van wat voor jullie realiteit is geworden.

    Ondertussen hebben we via de pers ook al begrepen waarom jullie persé via Panama wouden gaan 🙂

    Ik weet niet of Peru nog op het programma staat maar hierbij, zoals beloofd, het adres waar wij destijds verbleven, niet zo ver van Machu Pichu en van waaruit we een schitterende trekking door de bergen hebben gedaan:

    http://www.chullpas.pe/de/

    https://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g294321-d656511-Reviews-Las_Chullpas_Eco_Lodge-Urubamba_Sacred_Valley_Cusco_Region.html

    Misschien wel best vooraf eens contact opnemen want ik meen te hebben begrepen dat de vroegere eigenaar, Challo, die tevens onze gids was, intussen de lodge zou hebben overgelaten…

    Geniet intussentijd volop van de wereld, de mensen, het weer en van elkaar. Jullie worden gemist, da’s zeker waar; af en toe zijn we op zondagmorgen eens een Vuile Brakee of twee kwijt, bij gebrek aan officiële “teller”. Maar er blijven er nog genoeg over, maak jullie dus maar geen zorgen.

    Vele groetjes,
    Dikke knuffels,
    Gino en Dorine

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