Ecuador shamans often visit pyramids built in Ecuador.

Yesterday Blaine Watson began began his two day course that will be followed by an Ecuador shaman tour.

We began Blaine’s course with a a tele conference and  spoke to the group about Quantum mechanics… about Dan Brown’s new book… “The Lost Symbol” that explains how America’s founding fathers used astrology in many ways including how and when to set the cornerstone of the White House.

We also talked about the irony of science and human knowledge. During George Washington’s era or perhaps a bit before… had I suggested that I could sit in Florida and see and be seen and hear and be heard instantaneously by a group of people in Ecuador, I might have been burned at the stake for witch craft.  Yet astrology then was a common tool of knowledge.   Today we take tele conferences for granted… yet many equate astrology  with witchcraft.   Funny isn’t it?

Blaine sent this report:

I reached Ecuador last night and arrived in Cotacachi after midnight.  The sun is shining very brightly this morning so it is not possible to sleep in in spite of the time zone difference.  I never cease to be attracted to the beauty of this country, the volcanoes, even in the dark, blue in the full moon light and reaching for the sky, the quietness of the countryside, the openness of the faces and the relatively stress free eyes.

The first three photos are taken from the balcony outside my door at Meson de las Flores.

Gary has many more beautiful shots of this area in his newsletter but this is what I see when I look out.

I am up on the 3rd floor so it is very pretty.

The town of Cotacachi is a primarily indigenous town situated between two volcanoes. I have written of this before and how sacred it is here at the center of the earth.

Mid afternoon yesterday I joined Bonnie Keough (who will guide the shaman tour after my course) to visit Cochasqui.

Gary had been telling me about this for a while now. It is an ancient pyramid site, pre-Incan, which was discovered only as recently as 1962. There are 15 pyramids ranging from small to large.  Five of these Ecuador pyramids still have the dirt ramps leading up to the top platform. What I was not able to find out is whether the ramps were part of the original construction or put there when the people who built them covered them with earth to hide them from the Incans.

The significance of this place is astronomical, literally.   Two of the pyramids that have been partially excavated were the lunar and solar pyramids.  All of the pyramids are constructed of fired volcanic earth rather than stone.

The top platform of the solar and lunar pyramids are covered with a 3-4 inch thick ceramic calendar, circular in shape. There is a lunar calendar at the top of the lunar pyramid.

Lunar calendar.

There is a solar calendar for the solar pyramid.

Solar calendar.

This is the largest solar calendar in the Americas.  The site is located at 0 degrees 0 minutes and 3 seconds of latitude so virtually on the equator.

Because of the relative physical stillness of the location, no centrifugal force or precessional movement, it must have been very easy to observe the stars clearly. The pyramids are at an altitude of over 9,000 ft.  From here you can see Cayambe (more on this in a second), Quito and virtually all of the major volcanoes in the region. The site was the capital of the people who lived in the area and the most important period of the years from what I was able to understand was the Spring Equinox.

The llamas in the photos are part of a herd of lamas that was grazing there.

This is a photo of one of the larger pyramids.

I was curious about the meaning of Cochasqui as there is no lake nearby at all. in Quichua, the indigenous language, Cocha means lake. I have sent out photos before of Cuicocha, the lake of the gods which is near here, about 20 minutes away.

The word Cocha is contained in the name Cochasqui. Yet there is no lake at Cochasqui.  It means the Lake of the Stars.  From here you can see the ocean of the sky.  So it means the Lake of the Stars brought here to earth. For an astrologer this is a bit like coming home.

I have yet to get to Cayambe which is very close by as well. You can see why this place is so sacred,  About 40 minutes from here, perhaps midway between Cotacachi and Cochasqui, is a place called Cayambe. Here at this spot you can see all of the stars of the northern and southern hemispheres simultaneously.  It gets cloudy at night so far so I have not been but if there is a clear night I will go for sure.
So, literally, a very heavenly place.

I thank Blaine for this information. Our May 13-14 Ecuador Shaman Mingo Tour will visit both Lake Cuicocha and the Cosaqui pyramids.

Gary

Join us in 2010. See our winter Ecuador real estate tours below.

Jan.   8-11     Ecuador Export Tour

Jan. 13-14     Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Jan. 15-18     Coastal Real Estate Tour
Jan. 19-20     Quito-Mindo Real Estate Tour
Jan. 21-23     Cuenca Real Estate Tour

Feb. 11-14   Quantum Wealth Florida – International Investing & Internet Business, Mt. Dora, Florida ($749) Couple $999

Feb. 15-16   Travel to and visit Quito
Feb  17         Travel to Manta
Feb. 18-19   Coastal Real Estate Tour
Feb. 20        Travel to Cotacachi
Feb. 21-22   Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Feb. 23-24  Quito-Mindo Real Estate Tour
Feb. 26-27   Cuenca Real Estate Tour

Mar. 11-14     Super Thinking + Spanish Course, Mt. Dora, Florida

Mar. 15-16    Travel to Quito and Andes
Mar. 17-18     Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Mar. 19-20    Cotacachi Shamanic Tour
Mar. 22-23    Coastal Real Estate Tour
Mar. 25-26    Cuenca Real Estate Tour

Enjoy extra savings with our special early bird Multi Tour Adventure fees (if you enroll through December 10, 2009)

(Be sure to show in the comments section which courses and tours you are attending)

International Club attend up to 52 courses and tours in 2010 free.

See our entire 2010 seminar and tour schedule here

Water share investments could get warm soon.

Sunday’s message on Green and Ecuador cars message looked at how wise investors can cash in by investing in green shares that are vital to society in the long term… but are more depressed more than the norm due to short term economic concerns.

This type of economic distortion may be especially true of water shares.

I love investing in water and have been recommending water shares for about a decade now.

We are in North Carolina at our farm and recently had a record number of days with measurable rain (13 days in a row I believe).  Our weather  man reported that this set a historical record.

Our creeks were roaring.  This is normally a small stream high up on the land.

Here is one of our waterfalls in normal times and…

after the rains.

Here is another fall normal… and

after the rains.

This creates a degree of aggravation… such as washing out our roads, like this but…

overall we are tickled. We love the water.  The large number of year round springs is one reason we chose this farm.  For example water gushes from the rocks at this one spring and…

fills our deep woods hot tub…

with continual fresh water, plus…

provides all of the water supply in our house and helps fill this pond, plus…

creates this water fall that fills a fish pond in our back yard as well as fills a stock tub in our chicken pen.

This is just one of dozens of springs on the land.  We feel blessed as water is becoming one of humanity’s most precious commodities!

This is why as I look for good value equities to buy now, I am studying two water ETFs (Exchange Traded Fund). One of the ETFs is the PowerShares Water Resources Fund.

This ETF invests in the shares that compose the Palisades Water Index which is an equal-dollar weighted stock market index that tracks the performance of companies engaged in the global water industry.   The PowerShares Water Resources Fund aims to match the performance of this index.

Shares in this index include pump and filter manufacturers, water utilities, and irrigation equipment manufacturers.

Here for example are the seven large holdings in the index:

* Tetra Tech (NASDAQ: TTEK) 4.58%
* Itron Inc (NASDAQ: ITRI) 4.12%
* Urs Corp (NYSE: URS) 4.07%
* AECOM (NYSE: ACM) 4.00%
* Danaher Corp (NYSE: DHR) 3.98%
* Badger Meter (AMEX: BMI) 3.95% (flowmeters)
* Veolia Environnement (NYSE: VE) 3.92%
This chart from Finance.yahoo.com  shows how this ETF  was clobbered in 2008.

Yet the need for water has not diminished.  This makes the fund especially worthy of research… for value.

I’ll be sending this full report to my multi currency investing subscribers shortly. For details about this service see www.multicurrencyinvesting.com.

Ecuador Water

This is why I recently sent a message about Ecuador property and water. Here is an excerpt from this message:

Some parts of Ecuador have great… even special waters like Chachimbiro Thermal Springs which are just over the mountain from our El Meson hotel in Cotacachi.

This is a wonderful natural place where we can celebrate and immerse ourselves in the pure water of Ecuador. When we visit the waters of Chachimbiro early morning weekdays, we are the only people there.

Cotacachi has good water as well… that comes from springs fed by the ice from Mount Cotacachi and Mount Imbabura.

Our hotel staff at Meson de las Flores ozonates the hotel’s water  supply so Merri and I drink out of the tap there.

Plus there are numerous lakes near by like Lake Cuicocha.

and high mountain lakes.

However, in general, the water service quality in Ecuador is suspect so keep this in mind when looking at Ecuador property. Read the entire article at Ecuador Property and Water.

The best proven way to make good long term investments is to always look for and invest in value.  Sometimes our search for value leaves us high and dry.   You can be sure that looking for value in water will not leave you all wet!

Gary

Learn more about investing in water and Ecuador in our upcoming courses and tours.

June 12-14 Shamanic Mingo Tour

June 16-17 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

June 18-21 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

July 4-8  Ecuador Export Tour

July 8-9 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

July 10-13 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

July 24-26 IBEZ North Carolina

Sept. 17-21 Ecuador Spanish Course

Sept. 23-24 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Sept. 25-28 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Oct. 9-11 IBEZ North Carolina

Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Expedition

Nov. 6-8 IBEZ Ecuador

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Attend any two Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two.

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799 for two.

Ecuador property values are dramatically affected by water supply.

Some parts of Ecuador have great… even special waters like Chachimbiro Thermal Springs which are just over the mountain from our El Meson hotel in Cotacachi.

This is a wonderful natural place where we can celebrate and immerse ourselves in the pure water of Ecuador. When we visit the waters of Chachimbiro early morning weekdays, we are the only people there.

Cotacachi has good water as well… that comes from springs fed by the ice from Mount Cotacachi and Mount Imbabura.

Our hotel staff at Meson de las Flores ozonates the hotel’s water  supply so Merri and I drink out of the tap.

Plus there are numerous lakes near by like Lake Cuicocha.

and high mountain lakes.

Lake Donoso is above Cotacachi at 12,000 feet.

However, in general, the water service quality in Ecuador is suspect.

Water supply services are often interrupted and are well below standard, particularly in poor outlying areas.  According to Wikipedia in 30% of the urban areas, there is no treatment of superficial potable water. 92% of waste water is discharged without any kind of treatment.

The outlook for improvement is not great either.  According to a 2004 sustainability study only 13% of the water systems are considered sustainable.

So when looking at Ecuador property, but sure to check the availability of water.

On Ecuador’s coast for example many villages do not have a piped water system. Water is delivered in trucks like this.

The water delivered in this way is pretty good and inexpensive (drivers are not paid a lot and obviously not much is spent on the trucks).  However water sources are always worth checking.

Don’t rely on what you are told on paper either. Make sure the supply is real. We made an offer on one farm… being told there was a huge water supply.  We were shown the papers proving the supply existed and we hiked up to see the enormous beautiful spring itself.  However,  further research showed that the local community had always objected and had disturbed the pipeline.

This is one reason I like the Vistazul condo project. They have their own wells and have placed a huge water tank at the top of the cliffs behind the condos for excellent water pressure.

Here are delegates on our last Ecuador coastal real estate tour going over to look at the Vistazul model which is 75% complete.

For more details on the Vistazul beach condo project contact  Kjetil Haugan at kjetil@haugancruises.com

This is one reason I also like the Arboretto Mindo property project developed by Dr. Andres Cordova and Carlos Tobar.

Water in this area is plentiful plus Andres and Carlos have made a great effort to make this a successful green project that is in tune with the environment and the water. The Mindo Project has now taken a qualitatively superior dimension and is poised to become a statement project for Ecuador and beyond.

Here are plans for houses on water at the project.

Arboretto also has a wonderful river flowing through it.

For more details on water at the Arboretto Mindo property project contact  Carlos Tobar at cetobar@yahoo.com

Here are more shots of Lake Donoso… water…  recreation…. sport.

Ecuador is a land of great beauty.  There is plenty of water but…

be sure that some of that water is…

in the area…

where you buy.

We have been recommending investing in water for the past ten years or so. Water is important. This belief has good numbers to support it.

  Investments in water have outranked most other investment sectors.

  There are other solid reasons to invest in water:

 The first is obviously supply and demand. Water will become scarcer in the future because there is a growing global population that will consume and pollute more water.

Increased government regulations about water create opportunity.

Opportunities exist in many areas of the water industry from bottling to replacing water infrastructures to water line and water main replacements that create growth in pipe companies.

The increasing demand, reduced supply and enhanced value of water worldwide is a most basic fundamental even more important than oil!

When you invest in real estate… in Ecuador… or anywhere check the water supply before you buy.

Gary

Learn more about Ecuador real estate and investing in water at our courses and tours.

June 12-14 Shamanic Mingo Tour

June 16-17 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

June 18-21 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

July 4-8  Ecuador Export Tour

July 8-9 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

July 10-13 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

July 24-26 IBEZ North Carolina

Sept. 17-21 Ecuador Spanish Course

Sept. 23-24 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Sept. 25-28 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Oct. 9-11 IBEZ North Carolina

Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Expedition

Nov. 6-8 IBEZ Ecuador

Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Attend any two Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two.

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799 for two.

Ecuador business opportunity is in the news.

There are numerous health benefits to be gained in Ecuador…

One of them is great exercise opportunities. We are currently conducting Blaine Watson’s Beyond Logic course.  The course sold out and a number of delegates arrived early so we took them for a hike…

To Lake Cuicocha…

Here we are.  Then we visited the Cotacachi food market to see…

another Ecuador health benefit. Fresh food!  Just picked beans…

of every sort.

Fresh berries…

are always in season.

Greens…

and much more.

All just picked and you can meet the farmer who grew them.

Some of the other Ecuador health benefits create business opportunity.

Ecuador herbal exports offer great potential but not without some work.

One MD who was recently here looking at the idea of exporting herbs recently sent this note.

I Just learned that the US Food and Drug Administration has recently cracked down on imports of herbs, minerals, etc. to the point that it is now all but impossible to import.   Other small herb companies I’ve talked with have stopped importing herbs at this point in time for these reasons.  The government is also arresting internet alternative nutritional sellers at an increasing rate.

This would at first seem like bad news.  However my experience has been that the greater the problem, the greater the opportunity.

These apparent problems  are an indication of the  really great need for health care in North America.   Another newsletter that often focuses on Ecuador,  NaturalNews.com, says:

Both the FTC and FDA are turning up the heat on nutrition-oriented companies and websites, resorting to arrests at gunpoint to enforce “nutritional illiteracy” across America by imprisoning those who accurately describe the health benefits of nutritional products they sell.

It was only days ago that the FTC attacked a church over its dietary supplements. NaturalNews covered the legal battle in a feature article and an exclusive audio interview with health freedom attorney Jim Turner.

Effectively, it is illegal in America to tell the truth about nutritional products that you sell. The statements made by Heuer on the Cocoon Nutrition website are technically factual and accurate. But they are not LEGAL to make in America because Free Speech is routinely oppressed by the FDA and FTC. Telling the truth in America is enough to get you locked up in federal prison; especially if you dare to inform people about natural cures that might take revenues away from the drug companies.

Both the FDA and FTC are now acting as the racket enforcement thugs of Big Pharma. And like any other mob, they use armed personnel to protect their revenue territories.

These are pretty strong words… but I do not doubt that they are true. Look how big pharma even takes on cities and states that try to reduce the cost of drugs for its citizens.

Last year the city of Duluth Minnesota created a program so its residents could import much less expensive Canadian drugs.  According to a February a February 26, 2008 Associated Press article, the Food and Drug Administration warned the city that a program to import prescription drugs from Canada and save money for city workers is  unsafe and most likely violates federal law.

The article stated: “In a letter to Duluth Mayor Don Ness, the FDA warned that any packages sent to employees would likely be detained by U.S. Custom and Border Protection.”

Yet the very same week an article in Senior medical news says:

Medicaid in Crisis as Bush Administration Tries to Shift Billions in Cost to States
Strained state budgets and economic downturn force program cuts

Feb. 21, 2008 – Medicaid is one of those government services that most of us think we will never need. Yet, millions of senior citizens and their families have grasped for it as the last hope for access to costly long-term care, as their savings disappear. It is also the last chance for many of the uninsured at the bottom of the economic ladder to receive medical attention. The program, however, is in crisis as the Bush administration tries to move billions of dollars of cost to the states.

The states, however, are already crumbling under the burden of ever-higher healthcare costs, a poor economy and their own budget woes. In Iowa the governor reducing costs, including capping rate increases for long-term care. California’s governor is cutting over $500 million from the Medicaid program and in Congress there is an attempt to stop or delay the new effort to move more costs to the states.

So as stated the greater the problem, the greater the opportunity.

US medical care costs are a huge problem and herbs from the Equatorial Amazon are one low cost solution.  Those who figure out how to overcome artificial obstacles thrown in the way of these natural solutions stand to profit.

This is why we started Tangled Webs  a course about how to create your own business…on the web…the internet so we can plunge deeper then just business and internet technology to truly understand the web.   This electronic virtual world is just a reflection and tool in a much bigger…deeper…real web…that will provide many solutions in the future.

Business… the world… the universe… existence… all of life…is a tangled web… that has been spun and continues to spin from almost imperceptible threads.

These threads, spun from our hidden unwinding, have brought us to the internet…as a reflection of who we have been…what we now are and who we will become.

Consequently a course on just the internet would be like a car without an engine. A course just about the internet and business would be a complete car but without a driver.   Plus we need to include the journey and destination as well!

Tangled Web weaves the history of Merri’s and my business … how it evolved … how it morphed from a print publishing business to internet only and how we use websites and email in business now.

We’ll look at how to create websites using the seven Ps…

Passion
Problem
Person
Profitably Priced Product
Prospecting Path
Promise
Presentation

Our webmaster examine all the technical aspects of how to run an internet business:

Search Engine Optimization
Pay Per Click
Landing Pages
Email Generators
List Controllers
Shopping Carts
Servers

Yet we’ll dig deeper, right to the essence of a successful internet business that successfully untangles the web because I suspect that this course has the possibility to go out of date faster than any I have ever written before. The Internet evolves so quickly and there are always new things being added. It’s enough to make your head spin.

But what you will learn here are the fundamentals that work in business on the Internet. We’ll cut through the fog and show you what works for us and how to build a solid business regardless of what changes come about in technology, search engines or what the new “Internet fad” may be.

We will also deal with evolution and fate… how they work in business and how they can help your web business grow from this starting point.

This course will end differently than foreseen. Each sentence shared has potential to spark new ideas.  Your questions, as the course unfolds, will undoubtedly alter the course of this course.

I can almost guarantee that your business will not evolve exactly as you imagined either.  Business plans are guesstimates that help improve a business as it grows…but rarely a real guide.  Experience refines and improves us as our act of doing a business teaches us.  We can never see what we do not know. Only doing reveals this.  Plus technology and fate mix into our progress as well.

Here are the lessons we have planned now.

#1: How My Internet Business Began

#2: Our Results – How We Boost sales

#3: Seven Ps PASSION – PERSON – PROBLEM – PROSPECTING PATH – PROMISE – PRESENTATION – PROFITABLE PRICE

#4: Turn Passion to Profit.

#5: How to Identify your prospects.

#6: How to identify problems.

#7: How to choose prospecting path. SEO – PPC – Strategic Alliance – Referals – Viral marketing.

#8: How to create ads.

#9: How to create landing pages.

#10: How to develop Presentation (marketing string).

#11: How to choose and test price.

#12: How & why to create daily messages.

#13: Multi product development…free reports…free ezines…paid subscriptions…seminars…tours ,,,personal services…clubs etc. How one product leads to another.  Advertising and especially the long tail.

#14: How to manage your business finances.

The first four lessons are complete and students are gaining from this course now.

Join us in Cotacachi and on Ecuador Coast in March and save from a special offer on this new course.

You can enroll in this special course for $299. However if you sign up for our three courses in March 2009, I will send it to you free. You save $299.

March 8-9 Imbabura Real Estate Tour

March 10-15 Ecuador Import Export Expedition

March 16-19 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Bob Shane will be at our March courses and will be available to provide health balancing.

Get our web based course FREE if you join us in Ecuador this February or March.

Attend any two Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$949 for one.  $1,349 for two

Attend any three Ecuador courses or tours in a calendar month…$1,199 for one.  $1,799 for two

Future 2009 courses

May 29-31  JGAM Global Asset Strategy Seminar

June 12-14 Shamanic Mingo Tour
June 16-17 Imbabura Real Estate Tour
June 18-21 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

July 3-6     Ecuador Import Export Expedition
July 8-9    Imbabura Real Estate Tour
July 10-13 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

July 24-26 IBEZ North Carolina

Sept. 17-21 Ecuador Spanish Course
Sept. 23-24 Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Sept. 25-28 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour

Oct. 9-11     IBEZ North Carolina

Oct. 21-24 Ecuador Import Export Expedition

Nov. 6-8    IBEZ Ecuador
Nov. 9-10 Imbabura Real Estate Tour
Nov. 11-14 Ecuador Coastal Real Estate Tour