Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

Travel

None

Thailand—Where it Never Snows—Wins Snow Sculpture Contest

The festival, billed as an international gathering point that “evokes a pristine snow fantasy,” attracts around 2 million people each year

A sea turtle farm in Gran Cayman

Captive Sea Turtles Extract Their Revenge by Making Tourists Sick

Captive sea turtles in the Caymans can ruin a tourist’s visit with a nasty dose of bacteria, viruses, fungi or parasites

Aramaic is one language scholars are racing to save.

How to Revive a Lost Language

By the year 2100, the human race will have lost about 50% of the languages alive today. Every fourteen days a language dies. There are some success stories

The intent stare of an unknown dog strikes dread in the experienced cycle tourist. Most healthy-looking animals, no matter how mean, probably do not have rabies, but if bitten one must receive treatment.

Bike, Bark, Bite, Blood: The Perils of Cycling in Rabies Country

An unfortunate run in with a mutt in Ecuador turned into a trip to the doctor’s to be treated for rabies, a surprisingly fatal disease

Footballer in the making? This young Ecuadorian seems drawn to the oblong shape and peculiar design of a football on a soccer field in the city of Cuenca.

A Football Team With No One to Play Against

Listen closely around the public parks of Quito, Ecuador, and you just might hear that familiar sound: “Hut hut hike!”

None

Tour the Grand Canyon From Your Computer With Google Street View

Now, thanks to Google, you don’t need a plane ticket or hiking boots to experience some of the Grand Canyon’s geologic magic

None

Strange Ball in a Strange Place: Watching the Super Bowl in Ecuador

America’s Biggest Game brings excitement, curiosity and some boredom to Ecuador

None

Quantum Physicists Show What Time Travel Could Look Like

Quantum physics professors at the University of Ulm in Germany, have created a mathematically-accurate visual approximation of the hypothetical Gödel model of the universe. That is, they show what it would look like if you could simultaneously see past, present, and future versions of physical objects. Sandrine Ceurstemont of New Scientist, who compiled the video […]

About 15 miles north of Quito, a yellow line representing the Equator runs up a long, regal walkway to the base of the Mitad del Mundo monument, built in 1979. The thing is, they built the structure several hundred feet south of the true Equator.

Much Ado About Nothing at the Equator

Just north of Quito stands a grand and glowing tribute to one of Ecuador’s proudest features: the Equator. The problem is, it was built in the wrong place

None

SpaceX Wants to Fix Boeing’s Faulty Batteries, Possibly to Embarrass Them

Elon Musk has been critical of Boeing in the past

None

Parking Meters, Originally Meant to Keep Traffic Moving, Need an Update

The long history of the parking meter - innocent seeming towers behind much of today’s driving woes

None

Things to Do in Quito While Nursing Achilles Tendonitis

With its clean public parks, brewpubs, museums and tapas bars, Quito is a fine place to spend a week recovering from an injury

None

This Is What Being a Google Maps Editor Is Like

Google maps is back on the iPhone, and thank goodness because the whole world could basically not function without it. But how does Google Maps get made?

This sign just north of Tumbes is a clear sign, if the mangroves aren’t, that one is entering the muggy, and in some ways dangerous, tropics.

Ecuador, Land of Malaria, Iguanas, Mangoes and Mountains

The author leaves Peru behind and crosses into Ecuador, where he encounters his first sign of a mosquito

None

Scientists Don’t Quite Know How This Cat Managed Her 200-Mile Trek Home

Holly the cat’s 200 mile journey home has scientists wondering just how animals navigate

In Europe, These People Wouldn’t Be Allowed To Drive

A recent study found that drivers with blind spots were more likely to hit pedestrians and less able to respond to hazardous situations

None

What to Eat—or Not—in Peru

The ceviche carts and meat grills are colorful pieces of scenery, but eating a cherimoya or a sweet and starchy lucuma could be the truest taste of Peru

None

Star Trek Got Warp Speed All Wrong

Hold everything people. The blast of a star and light that happens in Star Trek when they jump to warp speed? Wrong! It wouldn’t look like that at all, according to some physicists

None

The Latest Fleet of 787s Is Nothing But Trouble

The new 787 Dreamliner fleet has been plagued with issues, including electrical problems, broken windows, fires and engine failures

Accompanied by a mat of long brown hair, these broken bones on the side of the highway most likely belonged to a woman.

Braving the Pan-American Highway of Death

Along the roadway in Peru, hand-built memorials to accident victims occur almost as regularly as the kilometer markers themselves

Page 82 of 132