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Ecuador
The equator, the Andes, and the Galápagos
Ecuador takes its name from the equator that crosses it, a compact country that compresses the Pacific coast, the high Andes, and the Amazon rainforest into a territory smaller than many of its neighbors. Offshore lie the Galapagos Islands, the volcanic archipelago whose finches and tortoises helped Darwin frame his theory of evolution. From the colonial streets of Quito, the highest official capital in the world, to the snowcapped cone of Cotopaxi and the steaming jungle of the Oriente, Ecuador holds remarkable diversity in a small frame.
A double row of Andean volcanoes runs down the country's center, an avenue of peaks that includes Chimborazo, whose summit at 6,263 meters is the point on Earth's surface farthest from the planet's center because of the equatorial bulge. West of the mountains lie fertile coastal lowlands that produce bananas, cacao, and shrimp, while to the east the land falls into the Amazon basin, rich in oil and biodiversity. The Galapagos, nearly a thousand kilometers offshore, form a living laboratory of endemic species shaped by isolation.
Part of the Inca empire before the Spanish conquest, Ecuador won independence as part of Gran Colombia in 1822 and became a separate republic in 1830. Its modern history has mixed political volatility with oil wealth, dollarization of its economy in 2000, and a strong Indigenous movement that has shaped national politics. Tourism centered on the Galapagos and the Andes, along with agricultural and oil exports, drives an economy in a country that markets itself as a microcosm of South America.