Day 1 - Quito and Middle of the Earth

After a short night's rest - you hit the ground running this morning.

Our first stop was Middle of the Earth Museum where we learned about life on the equator and some of the local indigenous cultures and some of the history of Quito and the French and Spanish influence.  We got to participate in several "experiments of being on the equator like try to balance on egg on a nail, walking in a straight line with eyes closed and gravitational pull by pulling fingers apart in the Southern Hemisphere and also right on the equator.  We also learned about the difference of the two different equators in Quito, the GPS versus magnetic (the GPS of being more accurate.   We also learned about the indigenous practice of shrunken heads and how they were made.  This practice still alive in some cultures here, although they have to use animals now. 

One of the houses we visited at the museum had some Guinea pigs there and we learned about their special powers of healing people by taking away their bad spirits.  Guinea pigs are also a delicacy for eating here.  Some of the students are asking if we would get the chance to try it.

From their we made our way to the cable cars to go up the side of the Pichincha volcano and get a bird's eye view of how expansive Quito is.  This volcano lasted erupted in 1999.  We were lucky and got down before it decided to erupt again.

Once down into the valley again we headed to Historic Quito for lunch and a walking tour.  Lunch was amazing.  We had appetizers of different root vegetable chips with different sauces (tree tomato, pumpkin seed and peanut), next was some shrimp cerviche and the main course of sea bass.  Dessert was interesting with plantain and blackberry ice cream being served by a beloved Quito character with bowls with dry ice below so they were steaming.  It was delicious and all the kids seemed to enjoy it.

Off we went to walk off all the calories we had a lunch.  We learned about the government, visited the president palace, and several churches including the La Iglesia de la Compania de Jesus which was spectacular, but we were not allowed to take in there, but it combined both Baroque and Moorish architecture.  It was quite ornate and was covered in gold leaf.  We continued our walking tour learning about the Virgin Mary and her importance in Ecuadorian culture and continued up to the large stature of the Virgin Mary overlooking the city with her arm outstretched to bless everyone within the city.

We ended the day with a cooking class.  The kids learned how to make calzones.  They prepared everything for the meal themselves and made individual calzones for themselves.  We were a bit surprised that they put kiwis and chocolate in their calzones.

After dinner, it was back to the hotel around 9:30 and straight to bed for an early start tomorrow.