Go Galapagos!

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Very excited, our taxi collected us a little earlier than expected to take us to the domestic airport to catch our 8.20am flight to Baltra, the famous Galapagos islands. We had to go in transit via Guayaquil, a very affluent resort style city, with expensive properties built around lagoons. We were impressed by the prosperous waterfront, an outdoor showpiece of Guayaquil and the posh airport facilities.

We arrived in Baltra, the airport runway sparse and desolate, decorated with strangely shaped cacti, it was midday. The airport was still in the construction process, and resembled a wooden shed open to all the surrounding elements! Baggage came tumbling off a small vehicle, where we would then search for our bags amongst the piles of other passengers' belongings. Then we were collected by a representative from the Sea Man, who then treated us to lunch in a posh restaurant.

We boarded a bus for a short ride until we arrived at a small stretch of water. Here we caught a small motor boat and were transferred to the other side where we would continue our journey to Santa Cruz, through patches of rainforest with a few dwellings dotted around, frequently stopping to pick-up/drop-off some of the locals. After our guide took us to the Charles Darwin Research Centre in Santa Cruz (the largest populated island of all the 5 inhabited ones), where we learnt about the conservation issues of the island, watched a short documentary and then met the giant Land Tortoises. We were impressed by their shear size and speed, some misbehaving though! Here we also learnt about their tortoise rearing programme for this threatened species and met the nursery-aged tortoises - very cute! We also made acquaintance with lonesome George, who approximately 80 years old, and is the sole remaining survivor of the Pinta Island tortoise species. It is very sad as he will leave behind no offspring, and has no interest in reproducing with any of the other females at the centre, so this really sums up the importance of protecting the archipelago and its' endemic species.

On our way back we saw many jet-black Marine Iguanas basking on the jetty, Brown Pelicans perched on fishing boats and nesting in the trees, and a stunning Blue Heron putting on a show for us. We also observed Lava Lizards, Yellow Canary, Frigate birds, Galapagos Sea Lions basking on the Seashore and some resting in an anchored fishing boat, bright orange Sally Lightfoot Crabs climbing up the harbour wall, and strangely shaped cacti - our first taster of the Galapagos. Introduced non-origin plants and animals have destroyed much of the native flora and fauna on this island.

Then we had some free time to sit by the waterfront admiring the views of the turquoise Pacific Ocean lapping the harbour wall, before being picked up in a small panga (dinghy), and taken to our vessel the Sea Man. Here we met our fellow crew members, a group of 14 people (all doing the 8 day cruise), and were then introduced to the crew guide and staff. We were suddenly confronted by a familiar face, Jon from our previous tour from Chile to Lima. It was quite hilarious to be in his company again, as we said previously that there was a strange magnetism between the three of us, as whenever we were exploring a city/site, we would always meet Jon! We even found him just awaking from one of the terraces at Machu Picchu.

Everyone was very friendly on-board, we enjoyed dinner and were then taken down to our compact cabin beneath the stairway. Luckily Debs had given us some sea sickness tablets just in case we felt the effects on our first night. Ellie suffered a little, which is unusual, but we think it was because the boat was small and we travelled a vast distance on the choppy seas that night to reach our next destination Genovesa, crossing the equator line. Neither of us caught much sleep that night! From then on we took our tablets, and fortunately no re-occurrence. However we were not the only ones suffering, some people even felt the effects when we were land based, being so accustomed to the constant swaying of the boat!

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