Which way does your toilet flush? Ecuador is privileged enough to have toilets that flush every way possible: clockwise, counter-clockwise and straight down.

Today we journeyed to the equatorial center of the Earth — two of them actually. The first, represented by a large stone monument and classic European-style landscaping, is where the French decided was the equatorial line around 1736. The second, about 200 meters away and built up to look like a sad mini golf course, is where someone came along — GPS in hand — and declared the actual equatorial line. Whoops.

Here Dave debates about whether he should jump over the “equatorial” line.

While we went to the stone monument spot first, and were impressed with the landmark, we were told the GPS spot couldn’t be missed, and apprehensively left our equatorial theme park to venture to the other side of the cement wall. We exited through an iron gate, held open by the security guard, and were told to walk along the road, turn left, and go another 150 meters along a dirt path. The only indication of anything of interest in that direction was a faded, dirty sign that had a small arrow at the bottom and text that read 150m.

And although our guide was clearly upset that the English-speakers cut his lunch-break short, he went through the full spiel. The $4 admission didn’t seem to be worth it after only seeing anaconda skins and photos of Amazon aborigines. But our guide pulled it together for the finale when he led us to the actual center-of-the-Earth line.

Here he did the water flow experiments, and we also successfully balanced an egg on top of a nail, which is possible because there are equal forces on both sides.

El Norte

El Sur

La Mitad

The same effect on your inner ear makes it really hard for you to balance, so walking the equatorial line is actually quite difficult.