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Well g´day,
After more than 4 months of mountains, beaches, rainforrests, tropical savana´s and ancient civilisations we have finally said farewell to South America. With so many highlights behinds us including Patagonia, Iguazu falls, Rio de Janerio, the Altiplano and Machu Picchu it would have been easy to forgive South America if our last month wasn´t quite as highlight filled but instead we found ourselves absolutely awestruck more than once as we took in the wonders of the Galapagos Islands and the beauty of Columbia before sailing away into a Carribean sunset. So here we go..............
Arriving in Galapagos we welcomed the tropical climate after over a month of feeling the cold as we skipped through the Andes. After touching down and catch ing the bus to Peurto Ayora we were thrilled to see that dive shops lined the main street - Charles Darwin Avenue, and after quickly finding some accommodation we set to looking for someone to teach us how to dive. Thankfully we happened across a smaller shop owned by a born and bred Galapagos local named Macarron, whó´s completed more than 5000 dives over the last 7 years. In the last 12 months he started his
own company and after introducing himself told us we were able to start or PADI Open Water Diver course first thing the next day. So the next day we started the course along side an english guy from Bristol who introduced himself as having the same name as six english kings and a beatle - George. So over the next 4 days we set about learning the theory and some of the basic skills you need in order to become a qualified diver. It was really quite an eye opener, I´d always been under the impression that there wasn´t much more to diving than strapping on an air tank, a mask and some flippers before diving into the depths. But it turned out to be quite a bit different to that and fortunately our patient instructor watched and laughed as we struggled with dropped weight belts, free flowing regulators and masks that filled with water. Add to this the fact that we seemed to be able to gasp our way through a tank of air in only 30 minutes when he could easily last 90 minutes and you might wonder how we ever managed to pass. But thankfully with a
little practice and a lot of coaching we were able to get all these things under control before taking and passing the exam. We were finally ready to dive Galapagos.
For our first foray into diving we headed to a site called Floreana, approximately 90 minutes by fast boat from Puerto Ayora. Fortunately using a concoction of medication I was able to stave off the seasisckness that had plagues my previous outings on the water and I arrived at Floreana with my breakfast still intact. While others were preparing their gear and going through a basic skills drill we took the opportunity to snorkel with the playful sea lions that inhabit the various islands in the galapagos. Because they´ve evolved in an envronment where they´ve never been hunted the sea lions have no fear of people and are inquisitive and playful beyond belief. While we floundered around in the water like the useless land based creatures that we are, they glided gracefully amongst us pausing only long enough to blow a stream of bubbles in our faces before taking off once again making a complete mockery of our swimming ability.
With everyone kitted up and ready to go
we dove in descending to around 18 meters depth before making our way around a rock wall. And what a world it is down there. Within minutes we had encountered a wall of tropical fish so thick you couldn´t see trough it. As well as this we saw schools of tuna, barracuda, scorpion fish, white tipped sharks around 150cm long and my personal favourite giant turtles. These turtles are truly awesome and every bit as cool as they are portrayed to be in the movie Finding Nemo. And like the sea lions these animals are almost as interested in us as we are in them, swimming along side us just long enough to give us an absolute thrill before taking off into the deep blue. Our second dive of the day was just as awesome as the first and when we returned to the surface everyone was grinning from ear to ear. Our only slight disappointment was thast we didn´t manage to find the whale shark that one dive group had encountered the previous day - still it was awesome. Anyone out there who is contemplating getting into diving should definately give it a go. I can´t reccommend it highly
enough. We returned to Peurto Ayora totally exhausted and decided to take the next day off before our next dive.
The next day wew headed off to Tortuga Beach and finally, we found a beach to rival those that Australia has to offer. Blue water, white sand, no rubbish and a decent break. Add to this the only company we had were the marine iguana´s native to the galapagos. These creatures certainly look like a throwback to the time of the dinosaurs. But after a relaxing day we were prepared for the challenge of diving at the Galapagos Islands most famous site - Gordon Rocks. Gordon Rocks is about 1 hour from Peurto Ayora and what makes famous is the wild life there. And what attracts the wildlife is the savage current that flows past the rocks that tries to tear off your mask and pull you several kilometers out to sea while you hang onto a rock face for dear life and try to watch what swims past. And it is totally worth it. Within 5 minutes of entering the water 5 hammerhead sharks about 3 meters long each had cruised past us. And that was just the
beginning. We also saw more gaint turtles, and a big moray eel but this was nothing compared to what occurred during our second dive of the day. We were getting white knuckle fever trying to hold onto the rocks when out of the gloom came a school of around 50 hammerhead sharks, some over 3 meters in length while the young were about 60cm long. We watched for over 5 minutes as the school passed us. As they were swimming into the current they appeared to be going almost in slow motion and some came almost close enough for us to reach out and touch! It was one of the most amazing things I have ever seen.
The next day we headed out to another dive site called Seymour. As we were getting ready we had a classic Jaws moment as a white tipped shark circled our boat with just its dorsal fin out of the water. As we were about to jump in Hughie made the comment that what we were doing went against every survival instinct in his body. I had to agree. We again saw turtles, an abundance of fish, as well as a huge number
of both white tipped and reef sharks. Some of the white tipped sharks were also quite inquisitive and when they eye you off and swim towards you it certainly makes the heart pump a little faster. We saw one other remarkable creature - a pair of golden rays. Golden rays are not actually golden which is why I prefer to call them dalmation rays. On their upper side they have spots that look quite similar to those that you´d see on a dalmation. Again at Seymour we had to contend with a strong current but by this stage we were learning to enjoy it. With the presence of a current you can remain motionless and be swept along with a complete feeling of weightlessness. After commenting on this many people with much more experience than us told us that diving is as clost to flying as people can get.
After 2 consecutive days diving we decided to take the day off, diving is quite a bit more strenuous than you might imagine. So with our free day we wandered up to the Charles Darwin Research Centre. This centre is dedicated to preserving the national park that is the Galapagos
Islands but more importantly it has been responsible for rebuilding the populations of some of the Galapagos´ native creatures that have been decimated by hunting and introduced species. Most famous out these are the Gaint Tortises. The land based Giant Tortises that once roamed the various islands of the Galapagos were almost hunted to the point of extinction by sailors passing through the Galapagos. This was because the tortises could be kept alive aboard the sailing vessels for long periods of time before being slaughtered to provide fresh meat for the crew. Add to this poachers killed many tortises for their shells and the perceived mystical properties of certain body parts and the tortises were pushed to the brink of extinction. Fortunately the staff at the research centre have been able to breed many tortises in captivity before releasing them back to the wild, and combined with the removal of predators and the populations have recovered well. The sad exception to this rule is Lonesome George, the last of his species who was bought to the research centre in the late 1970´s. Despite their best efforts George also refuses to mate with either of his two constant female companions who
are most closely related to his own species and so it seems that Lonesome George will be the last of his kind. One terrific thing at the centre is that you are free and able to enter to enclosures where the mature tortises are kept. It is fantastic to see these massive, prehistoric creatures up close and watch as they walk ever so slowly towards you, carrying their immense weight on stubby legs. Up close they certainly look every bit of the hundreds of years of age these creatures are. Also at the research centre we were able to see the colourful land igunana´s and also read about the finches upon which Darwin based much of his research. His theory of evolution was based on these finches and how the ones that had evolved ondifferent islands has developed different characteristics, especially related to the beak, depending on their available food source. Some had pointier harder beaks for breaking hard seeds while others had shorter more curved beaks because of their different diet. The Research Centre was a great eye opener and once again highlighted the fact that the galapagos is different from anywhere else on earth.
For our final
few days at Galapagos we decided to take advantage of our excellent instrctor and mentor Macarron and complete our advanced open water diver course. With us for our course was one of the most interesting people we´ve met thus far on our trip. Jeremy is a Kiwi by birth, who has a house in Byron Bay Australia, but he never spends any time there because as a freelance aid worker for organisations such as UNICEF he is always overseas. Having travelled to more than 50 countries is impressive but the fact he has lived for over a year in 16 of these countries is seriously mind blowing. Without a doubt he has the best travelling stories of anyone I´ve ever met. Over the two days of our course we fine tuned our skills relating to bouyancy and navigation. It was quite amusing when Macarron instructed us to remove our flippers and hover at around 8 meters depth. Within moments of removing our flippers I had sunk like a stone while Hugh broke the surface like a torpedo fired from a submarine. Once again we were reminded that there´s more to diving than meets the eye. Also during our course I overcame one of my own fears and entered a cave which was filled with white tipped sharks and watched as they swam in and around us. For our final day of diving we returned to Gordon Rocks and completed first our deep dive - descending to 32 meters to experience the effects of nitrogen narcosis, which is similar to drunkeness and then completing a drift dive, which is simply a dive in a current. Again Gordon Rocks did not let us down and we firstly bserved a school of around 30 hammerheads swim below us, although it was unnerving when for no apparent reason they went from swimming happily in one direction at one moment to swimming full speed in the other direction a second later. My first though was ´what scares a school of sharks´ but fortunately nothing emerged from the gloom. Another highlight was when a school of about 50 golden rays swam, in perfect formation, over our heads and blocked out the sun leaving only silhouettes for us to see. It was like something out of a sci-fi film. Returning to land for the final time we´d have to say we ahd a sensational 2 weeks in the Galapagos, the longest we stayed anywhere in South America, and for any divers or aspiring divers it can´t be recommended highly enough. And if you do go make sure you pay a visit to Macarron at his shop on Charles Darwin Avenue. The man is a legend and does a great impersonation of a sea lion that has to be seen to be believed.
Returning to Quito we decided that rather than endure 2 days of buses to Bogota we would avoid the allegedly dodgy lower half of Columbia and fly.Arriving in Bogota we were immediately suprised by the evident wealth of the city. Where Bolivia, Peru and Ecudor had been poorer countries and slightly dirty and dilapidated, Bogota was clean with plaza´s and avenues. There are many museums within the city and more than once we were passed by a Porsche or BMW in the street. Of course with all this evident wealth only one thing sprang to mind - drug money. And the message from our hostel was crystal clear, ´do NOT go out after dark´. So despite the obvious beauty of Bogota an undercurrent of danger is still very present. Two days we spent in Bogota and we did a few laps of the city taking in the military museum and some of the churches and public buildings that make the city so impressive. One particular church was unlike any I´ve ever seen before with the whole builing being red and white stripped, not painted but rather made with stone somehow that way. We also ascended to a lookout for a bird eye view of the city which once again showed us how beautiful it was. One of the funnier things we did encounter was several streets made up entirely of army disposals stores. For a country that has had such a problems with guerilla warfare in the passed it was ammusing to find these streets in plain view that were more or less one stop shops for your average rebel. After our two days in Bogota we boarded a 22 hour bus ride and arrived eventually in exotic Cartagena. Amazingly upon arriving at a random hostel we walked smack bang into our Irish friends Eno and Kathy who had only arrived an hour before.
Cartagena is perhaps the most beautiful city in South America. Of the cities I´ve seen on this trip both Rio De Janerio and Cuzco could argue this point but set spectacularly on the Carribean sea what a city Cartagena is - especially it´s old town. A hilltop fort overlooks the harbour and old town complete with cannons and lookout towers from where once upon a time you would have been able to watch as the legendary Sir Francis Drake laid seige to the city. Below this the old town stretched out around the harbour behind old walls and it simply oozes charm. Entering the old town through the gates you could be forgiven for thinking you´d somehow tried to go to South America and instead ended up in Mediteranean Europe. My first thought when entering Cartagena´s old town was ´ít looks like Venice, only nicer´. Narrow streets are lined with hiistoric buildings that give way to a beautiful sqaure in the centre of town filled with old trees and fountains. The entire area is clean and neat and charming to walk through. Atop the wall surrounding the town you can once again see the cannons that once defended the town and imagine what has occurred in days gone by. After a day wandering the old town the next day we headed off on what was supposedly a snorkeling tour to Playa Blanca (the white beach) and once again the ugly side of tourism reared its head. After signing up, paying, and boarding the boat we were informed that there was actually no snorkeling and instead we spent approximately 3 hours sitting on a piece of junk boat to get to Playa Blanca before having 2 hours there and then turning around and going home. Playa Blanca was quite nice but as far as day trips go it could have been better. It was disappointing after such a great day the day before. The following day was spent organising our passage out of South America. The will be done aboard the 50 foot sail boat ´Seeaddler´ under the captaincy of a german expat named Guido. He only seems a little crazy which is apparently better than average for most sea captians. With 3 days to kill until we left we decided to take the opportunity to head up to Taganga, about 4 hours up the coast and do a little more diving.
Taganga was a small coastal town that like coastal towns around the world had swelled massively due to a long weekend. Despite this we managed to find beach front accomodation in a nice enough hostel. The next day we went diving and had a totally different experince to what we´d had at Galapagos. Because of the warmer water the sea life on the whole was far smaller, although we did see a massive moray eel but there was much more coral. The coral was very interesting some of it resembling a two dimensional tree while other coral resembled a small three dimensional topographical map. The following day we had contemplated heading off to Tayrona National Park which is very nice but with time running short we opted instead to hang around Taganga before the next morning heading back to Cartagena. After one night in Cartagena we went down to the docks and boarded the ´Seeadler´ which we were told means ´eagle of the sea´ and made ready to leave Cartagena. Around 6:00pm we sailed out of the bay into a Carribean sunset and watched as, after 4 fantastic months, South America disappeared slowly over the horizon.
The next two days were spent on the open ocean under both engine and sail power as we made our way toward Central America via the San Blas islands. Aboard the ´Seeadler´ besides ourselves were American's, German´s and English people who´d also decided to make the trip. Throughout the trip we took turns day and night of being on watch, which basically meant making sure no one fell over board and that we didn´t get in the way of any of the massive container ships that sail across the waters. After two rolling days we arrived at the San Blas islands that can only be described as so Carribean it almost a cliché. Just take a look at one of the photo´s and you´ll get the point. Two days were spent in and amongst the various San Blas Islands swimming, snorkeling and relaxing, before we once again took to the ocean for our final day and eventually made it to Portobelo. From there we made our way to Panama City where we are now. Tonight we head for Bocos del Toro on the Carribean coast of Panama, right near the border of Costa Rica which should be the start of 6 weeks of sun, surf and sand before we have flying visits to Miami and Montreal and then arrive in London.
I hope everyone at home is fit and well. Big thanks to everyone who made contact with me for my birthday, all the messages from home were very much appreciated.
Ciaó for now,
Dan
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Adrian
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Happy, Get a haircut.... Bobcat