Ecuador

Ecuador is named after the equator that runs through it, and despite being one of South America's smallest countries, it packs more biodiversity per square kilometer than almost anywhere on Earth. The country has four distinct worlds: the Pacific coast, the Andean highlands, the Amazon rainforest, and the Galápagos Islands — Darwin's living laboratory, 1,000 km offshore, where giant tortoises and marine iguanas live with no fear of humans.

Quito, the capital, sits at 2,850 meters in a valley surrounded by volcanoes, and its colonial center was the first place ever designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Avenue of Volcanoes — a corridor of snow-capped peaks including Cotopaxi and Chimborazo — is one of the most dramatic landscapes in the Americas. Ecuador adopted the US dollar as its currency in 2000, making it one of the few countries outside the US to use it. It's a country where you can breakfast on the beach, lunch in the mountains, and dinner in the jungle, all in the same day.