Galapagos Cruise

12/24/09

Today I flew from Quito to the Galapagos and boarded the boat, Yate Darwin. It is a 16 passenger boat, but we have 14 guests and 6 crew.

When I bought the cruise, a transfer from my hotel was included which sure made arriving at the airport easy. I had to first have my bags scanned – all bags going to the Galapagos are scanned for bugs, food, etc. - and then checked in. The flight was pretty uneventful, although I will say they are much more relaxed than we are about seat backs being upright and cell phones being turned off. About the time we started our decent, a flight attendant went through and opened all the overhead bins! They had made an announcement in both Spanish and English, but I didn’t understand either! A minute later, two of them came through again, this time with the first guy spraying from an aerosol can into the bins and the second guy shutting them again. They were spraying for mosquitoes! Also, when we got off the plane and were entering the terminal building, we had to walk through a wet matt, no doubt to kill any other bugs we may be carrying!

We were met at the airport by our guide and our group assembled. There is a couple from Finland, a couple from Canada and then the rest are from Australia and England. It is actually quite a young group with quite varied backgrounds: a Manchaster University Lecturer in Russian studies, two young Doctors on their year off before starting their internships in their specialties, a couple of teachers, a mother (nurse) and daughter (attorney), etc.

We boarded the boat a short drive from the airport and headed straight to a beach on the Isle of Santa Cruz. We had a “wet landing” direct from the dingy onto the sandy beach. Immediately, we saw turtles swimming in the water and two basking on the sun on the beach. Above tide line there were big indentations/holes/pits dug in the sand which were turtle nests. We walked along the beach to a lagoon and on the way we saw a number of marine iguanas, sally light foot crabs and at the lagoon, we saw a blue heron and about 20 pink flamingos. The frigate birds which had followed our boat were still flying over head as well as a number of pelicans. After our walk, we had the opportunity to snorkel. I didn’t do so well, as my mask didn’t seem to fit well, and without my glasses, I was a bit disoriented. Also, my left eye is quite pink and the salt water burned it quite badly.

When we re-boarded we headed out to another port where supplies were brought aboard and we enjoyed each other’s company and the guide, Alberto, went over safety instructions and gave a briefing for the next day. We were served a nice dinner and had a quiet evening visiting with the other passengers.

My roommate is a gal from the UK who has been traveling through SA for a number of months. Her sister was going to come, but was unable to due to health reasons. Her name is Sarah and she seems to be in her 30s or so and I think she will be a good roommate.

12/25/09 Christmas

Forgot to write this when I got up this morning, so I will see what I can remember! We visited South Plaza Island and then Santa Fe island. On South Plaza when we stepped ashore we were greated by sea lions, sally lightfoot crabs and iguanas.  Tons of iguanas. At Santa Fe we were in a beautiful cove with white sandy beaches and then a rocky shoal. While others went snorkeling around the edges, I swam off the back of the boat and floated on a life ring. Snorkeling just wasn’t working for me, with my left eye already irritated and pink, getting salt water in it was quite painful.

Anyway, it was an awesome day seeing an incredible amount of Galapagos wildlife. Just off the dingy on South Plaza, we saw sea lions, land iguanas, lizards, and a number of different birds. I got some great photos of the iguanas and of the dry cliffs and cactus. There is so much information given, and if I was a student and wanted to be able to remember it all, I would probably pay a bit more attention! There is a lot of discussion about the establishment of the species, and their adaptation to the islands. For example, there are three different finches on one island, and they are recognized by the shape of their beaks, which were adapted due to the type of food they eat. For me, it’s enough to get the general gist of the history and to look at the animals and birds.

We walked around on the second island, Sante Fe right before nightfall and on the dingy on the way back to the boat we saw a shark, a manta ray and a sea turtle, in addition to the constant sea lions. The sharks only come into the cove at night apparently. Or at least that is what they told us after we had all been in the water during the day!

The food aboard is quite good, and the crew is attentive. We have three meals a day, plus a small snack in the morning and the afternoon. Drinks are available from the bar and we all have water bottles that we fill from a larger one.

When we go ashore, the guide always is with us, but sometimes other crew members participate also. One of the crew takes the group snorkeling and another operates the dingy. Last night and today the captain also came with us, and got in his exercise by walking the beach.

12/26/09

During the night we traveled 7 hours from Sante Fe Island to Isla Espanola. It was difficult to sleep while we were going, but I slept deeply from about 4 to 6:30. On all of our other landings, the timing of the other boats (100 of them ply the Galapagos), has been good and we don’t see many other people, or if we do, our guides keep us separate and yet we have plenty of time to look and take pictures. Today though two other boats disembarked about the same time we did, and then more arrived at Isla Espanola while we were still on the beach. One of the boats is the National Geographic Explorer which is quite a bit bigger than our boat, and of course, has more people. I’m glad I am on this boat with capacity for 16, but only 14 on this part of the trip. We were at the beach from 8 until 10 which was just perfect for relaxing and watching the sea lions and birds. One gal was lucky enough to see a small sea lion that had just been born; the umbilical cord was still attached, the placenta was in the sand, and the little guy was trying to find the mother’s teat. I did see another young seal nursing, and could hear it suckling.

Some folks went swimming and snorkeling from the beach and then we re-boarded the boat and a group went out snorkeling along a rock wall on a small island/islet with caves. I certainly was not up to that, and have enjoyed having some unscheduled time to myself to relax. After having led a scheduled life for the last few months, and also in Vermont, it is nice to decide what I want to do on my own and not have every minute scheduled.

12/28

Yesterday was a great day with two beach landings and snorkeling for some. We then motored to a new island, Santa Cruz, in the afternoon and I managed to sleep most of the time! I am reading a book about German brothers who came to Santa Cruz Isla to escape WWII and were apparently successful in establishing, themselves, unlike many other people who came from all over the world to settle here. The book is called “My Father’s Island” by Johanna Angermeyer. We are at the largest town in the Galapagos, Puerto Ayora.

Today we went to the Charles Darwin Research Center and said goodbye to 7 of the passengers. Here we saw a lot of land turtles, including one known as “Lonesome George” as he is the only one left of his species. In the afternoon, I chose not to go to the highlands on the island, instead I visited with Sarah, my roommate who is leaving, and then I got a massage! Heaven. My back on the right side has been hurting and I really needed it. The bunks are hard as well as the pillows and the traveling by night in rough water doesn’t help much.

We had lobster for lunch today and then turkey for dinner! We were served on shore at a restaurant in a hotel owned by the same people who own the yacht we are on. Both were great. I also bought myself new earrings and a beautiful silver and black necklace – no t-shirt for me!

The new passengers are a young couple from Argentina, and a teacher couple leading a mother daughter team, a father daughter team, and a single gal. The girls are all around their late teens/early twenties and had one of the teachers while in high school. I have one of the girls for a roommate…she was quite surprised by how small the cabin is. Her name is Sarah, the same as my last roommate.

12/29/09

I did it! I snorkeled today – not once, but twice and it was fantastic! We saw 2 sharks in the morning and one in the afternoon. Others saw a huge manta ray in the morning, and then there was another in the afternoon. There were schools and schools of fish, starfish on the bottom, and sea lions zooming past us. Although I wish I could have more time snorkeling, I just wasn’t ready before and today went quite smoothly without any real issues. I did wear a life jacket that just gave me the confidence I needed and my eyes didn’t sting, and my ears were alright.

Besides the snorkeling we did two long walks on two different islands, the last of which we walked over old lava flows that were really cool looking. We also saw the Galapagos Fur sea lion and a lot of marine iguanas again. On the first island we saw an immature Galapagos hawk feeding on a dead young sea lion and then when we returned later, there was a mature hawk close by. Definitely smaller than a bald eagle, but still darned impressive.

I’m getting a bit tired of the food, however have been thrilled to have so many vegetables as I certainly don’t have many served to me in Otavalo. We have soup for our first course for lunch, but other than that, lunch and dinner are about the same. Either chicken or fish cooked in a sauce and rice and then the veggies. Not a lot of creativity, but good healthy fare. I am amazed it is all turned out by one man, Wellington, who is busy all day with the food prep. It is fun to watch him prepare, especially using a knife, when we are underway – he is quite skilled. It has been good having this break from school/teaching, but not so good that I haven’t been studying my Spanish much. I do try to talk to the crew everyday some, and they are very patient with me.

"Epilogue!"
The last two days of the cruise continued to be excellent, with snorkeling each day and new animals and new land formations. The first islands that we visited were the oldest of the archipelago so had more plant and animal life on them. The last island we visited was relatively new…just a few hundred thousand years old… and had very little plant and animal life but had fantastic views. The whole experience was fantastic: I so enjoyed being on the water and seeing so many unique animals. The company as a whole was good, and it was sooo nice to relax!

To see the rest of my picutes go to my picasa photo website: http://picasaweb.google.com/margie510
(I have to admit, I just loaded them all up there, without going through them first, as I had access to a fast internet connection in Quito and wanted to make use of it.)