The True Size of Latin America

 I've often wondered why I'm paying US east coast to west coast prices to hop from one country to another -- flight times *should* have been a clue -- but in my unthinking way I put it down to lack of competition.

Nope, it's because some of the distances I've been flying are comparable to coast to coast.  The Mercator projection that we all know and love shrinks the size of areas that are close to the equator.  Just take a look at these comparisons!




Looking at the map, from Lima, Perú to Santiago, Chile (my next trip) seems like a hop, skip, 'n' a jump, but in fact it's 2/3 the distance from west to east in the U.S.

Fun fact: the northernmost part of Brazil is closer to Canada than it is to the southernmost part of Brazil!





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