Chester and Kirsten

Girls Gone Galapagos

Chester and Kirsten

This is Kirsten and Chester's blog of our world travels. It is full of hilarious stories and adventures that only the 2 of us can get into. Many others come along for the fun and are included as well, but you can always be sure that Kirsten and Chester are in the middle of it all.



South America » Ecuador » West » Guayaquil June 17th 2019

Today we started our journey home. We had a pick up at 5:20 AM, which was fine because the beds in our hotel were not comfortable and neither of us was sleeping well. We made our way to the pier with tons of other people and it of course started to rain, which is awesome standing in with all of your luggage and bags and slippery ramps. We had our luggage checked for fruits and animals and waited for our vessel to be called. The words had barely left Chester's mouth saying, "As long as we don't run into that horrible German woman, we are good." When, guess what? Inga our favorite German and her husband were on the boat with us again (the lady who kept trying to push Chester over on the boat to ... read more
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South America » Ecuador » Galápagos » Isabela Island June 17th 2019

Another early morning and a day packed with adventure. Kirsten as always sets an alarm on her phone and we were set to get up at 6:30. This was not a shower day for Chester, so 30 minutes is all that is needed to get ready. Except, the alarm did not go off this morning, and Kirsten woke up at 6:40. No matter, we were both ready by 7 and had 15 minutes for breakfast before our first pick-up. Today we were hiking an active volcano. The hike was 16 KM, which is about 10 miles. We had all our gear: hiking boots, rain jackets, water, sunglasses. Thankfully, there were only 8 of us on the hike with our guide. Everyone was young and fit, except of course the two of us. We get shuttled every ... read more
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South America » Ecuador » Galápagos » Isabela Island June 15th 2019

Kirsten was complaining that we are do not get to sleep in at all on our trip. Today we were able to set the alarm for 7 am! For us, that was sleeping in. Chester was in bed last night early with her ear all jacked up, and Kirsten stayed up watching horrible television. We both still got plenty of sleep and were up and ready to go! Today was a travel day to another island after our morning excursion. That meant we needed to pack up everything before we left. Packing up everything didn’t mean the little lizard that was crawling around in Kristen’s suitcase before she finished packing. We definitely have some little creatures in our bags that are probably coming home with us. Jorge, our guide, picked us up at 8:30 for a ... read more
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Today was the day Kirsten has been most looking forward to and Chester has been dreading. Diving day!!! Kirsten loves to dive and Chester tolerates it in exchange of making Kirsten go to a soccer game when we get home. The day started like most others with breakfast, and then we headed to the dive shop. The dive company was very efficient and organized which is not always the case in some countries. We met our other diver partners and good news there was only 6 of us diving. Large group diving is not fun. We started with introductions and an overview in the office. Then as it seems with everything here, we loaded into trucks and drove 45 min to the dock. This is the same dock we were at yesterday and the same we ... read more
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Waking up in paradise is always an eventful morning. We were up and ready to go by our 7:30 pick-up time for a day of snorkeling and hiking. As it always happens to us when we are in a big tour, we were the first ones picked up by the bus, with many stops after picking up 10 other people. The last group to get picked up were at least 15 minutes late to board the bus, and then when they finally showed up they were four hot, skinny bitches and one old lady. It just gave us more reason to hate the last group. At least in the Galapagos, we were able to limit our excursions to a smaller group of under 16 people We are too old and just can’t handle the large group ... read more
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South America » Ecuador » Galápagos » Puerto Ayora June 13th 2019

Our day started off early with lots of travel ahead of us. We were up, ready and fed by 6:50 when Ramiro picked us up and took us to the airport. Traffic was pretty brutal but we made good time. And just like in the states, by the time we got to our gate, the flight was delayed. It wasn’t as bad as when we left Houston, only an hour late. We flew from Quito into Santa Cruz Island which is the most populated island We deplaned and made our way through their customs and had to pay $100 each to get into the Galapagos. It was fast and painless. Waiting for our luggage wasn’t as bad as it could have been either, plus we had great entertainment. Some dude had on quite the disarray of ... read more
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South America » Ecuador » North June 11th 2019

After a very late night arrival and adjusting our start time for the morning, we woke up to people talking in the hallway. Boutique in Spanish must mean "paper thin walls." The hotel, however, is old and really cute. We started with a colorful breakfast with some great local fruits, eggs and bread since he didn't get any dinner the night before. We met our guide Ramiro promptly at 10 AM to start our city tour. The weather did cooperate for the most part. It was low 60's and a bit overcast when we started but the sun did come out later in the afternoon. Our hotel was a few short blocks from the historic city center. The city center was bustling with tourists, locals and lots of police. Ramiro informed us that the city was ... read more
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South America » Ecuador » North » Quito » Historical Center June 10th 2019

Another year and another trip for Kirsten and Chester, but with everything going on in our lives, we decided to stay in the western hemisphere and keep the trip a bit shorter than our normal vacations. Also because we couldn’t find more than 8 straight days with no one visiting us in Denver. With that being said, this did not mean we couldn’t check-off another bucket list item. We are heading to Galapagos Islands off Ecuador for 8 days. Our usual decision on destinations was a bit rushed and this was a bit of a last-minute selection, simply because we are running out of places Kirsten or Chester haven’t been. But this is one of those places neither one has visited. The days leading up to the trip were a bit hectic. Kirsten had to travel ... read more
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Europe » Croatia » Istria » Krk June 8th 2018

Last full day of our Croatian trip. We didn't have much planned but Kirsten was excited because today we were scuba diving. Our guide picked us up and we left Opatija and headed over to the island of Krk. Our travel agent/trip planner Jen is from this island and she was planning to meet us at the dive shop this morning. She is a lovely woman and a great planner! She knows her stuff, so if anyone is planning to come over here, get her details from Kirsten, she's amazing. The dive shop was pretty small, and we should have known something was up when they didn't have many sizes for dive suits. Kirsten wore a lovely 2 piece number, while Chester was in a something about 3 sizes too big. And our dive guide even ... read more
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Pebble Beach
smelling the flowers

Europe » Croatia » Istria » Rovinj June 7th 2018

We had another full day in beautiful area of Istria. We were up and ready to be picked up by 9. Toure drove us about 90 minutes to a different coastal town north of where we are, and it's on the peninsula. It used to be an island, but they filled it in, so now it's a peninsula. The weather was sunny, hot and beautiful. We walked around this town that is very reminiscent of Italy. Venice is actually not that far away, 2 hours by ferry. The streets are all small and wind up the hill to a church. We stopped at spots to look at art and other souvenir shops. We toured the church at the top and then made our way down the other side of the church. The streets are made of ... read more
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