Chimborazo: The Highest Point on Earth!

Explanation: While I was hiking in Reserva Ecologica Antisana, in Napo Province of central Ecuador, I reveled in the spectacle of Mount Chimborazo. This is a major volcanic peak of the Andes Mountains of South America.

Its dense covering of ice fields and snow contrasted amazingly with the surrounding paramo grassland landscape of this tropical high-elevation treeless plateau.

But what I discovered only much later is that this peak is the highest point on Earth! This rings true, if you measure the surface of the Earth from the center of the Earth. The peak of Chimborazo is further from the center than any other peak on the planet ... including Mt. Everest!

And this is true because the Earth is not a true, perfect sphere, but rather what is called an "oblate spheroid." This shape is a sphere that bulges at the equator as the planet spins on its axis, with centrifugal forces causing swelling. The Earth's diameter is therefore greater measured at the equator than at the poles. The difference is minor, and not noticeable to the eye as viewed from space, but it is real.

And since Chimborazo is located essentially at the equator -- actually at only 1.47 degrees south latitude -- it has a "head start," in a sense, to reach further into space than any similar peak located off the equator.

So, as measured from local sea levels, Mt. Everest (29,032 ft or 8,849 m) is taller than Mount Chimborazo (20,548 ft or 6,263 m), but Chimborazo is higher as measured from Earth's center.

Mount Chimborazo's main peak, clad in snow and hanging ice fields:

Mount Chimborazo's secondary peak, a most rough climb! (No, I didn't climb.)

A land of major contrasts!

High elevation plateau (paramo)
treeless grasslands, volcanic
hills and peaks, and animals
both wild and domestic
such as evidenced by this
sheep's skull.

EPOW - Ecology Picture of the Week