Smacked not only at the center of the Earth but also in the middle of active volcanoes is Ecuador’s capital Quito, the second highest city in the world after La Paz, Bolivia. Despite being positioned in a fragile environment haunted by snow-capped, active volcanoes, Quito remains the largest, best-preserved, and least-altered historic center in Latin America. Similar to the ancient Roman city of Pompeii, Quito’s surrounding is like a ticking time bomb. Luckily it has been spared from major volcanic eruptions since the city’s inception in 1556.
While Ecuador (Spanish for equator) gives the impression that the city is filled with endless summers, the climate is actually closer to spring all-year-round, making it an ideal place for an active lifestyle. Eucalyptus forests cuddle the Parque Metropolitano Guanguiltagua, the continent’s largest urban park for picnics. La Carolina, the second-largest, is Quito’s Central Park, where Quinteños spend their week kite-flying and playing ecua-volley (Ecuador’s version of non-spike volleyball). A giant cross in the middle marks the spot where Pope John Paul II held mass in 1985.
The third largest, the El Ejido park, is a weekend souk for haggling traditional sweaters, ponchos, carpets, jewelry, and copies of paintings by the likes of Oswaldo Guayasamin and Eduardo Kingman. In another park, the La Alameda, a historic wanderlust begins with Simón Bolivar’s monument, paving way to a row of colonial houses lining up at Guayaquil Street. At the park’s center is Latin America’s oldest observatory, the Quito Observatory for meteorology and astronomy.
Quito is also known for its many religious houses. The 7,000-piece aluminum monument of the Virgin Mary in El Panecillo is popular among tourist because of its non-traditional pose. Apart from the El Panecillo, the aerial tramway of TeleferiQo in Cruz Laloma affords visitors with a view of the city from about 14,000 feet above sea level, where restaurants, amusement parks and shopping malls are surprisingly plenty.
La Mitad del Mundo, which translates to The Middle of the World, is a tiny northern village that has a chapel where couples go to marry in authentic Middle Earth style - where one spouse stands on the side of the northern hemisphere while the other one stands on the southern side and with a large marker where the equator was thought to have traversed in the ‘80s.
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