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Published: October 1st 2005
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What an amazing place!
Our trip to the Galapagos has more than exceeded our expectations. We had debated long and hard about the expense of this trip but it turned out to be worth every penny.
The week was spent onboard the Aida Maria, cruising around the islands. Our guide was a local and also a qualified marine biologist, who was very knowledgeable and had an uncanny ability to make the wildlife ‘perform’ for us.
Every day we were blown away by close encounters with the wildlife, which before this trip would have seemed unbelievable. We experienced enough in this week to take near enough 600 photos!! Unfortunately we can’t fit them all on our blog!
On our first day we visited Ochoa beach and went swimming. In the water we saw turtles and some friendly sea lions, however, we had to avoid the bull who kept barking at us. By the second day we already realized that sea lions were going to be a daily encounter.
Day two brought us face to face with many more animals. In the morning we took a dinghy trip around turtle cove, which lived up to its name as
being home to turtles (see photo). Also to be found were blue footed boobies, reef sharks, spotted eagle rays, golden cow-nosed rays and stingrays.
In the afternoon we went to North Seymour to a frigate colony. Here we saw nesting frigates and blue footed boobies, amazingly the parent birds showed no concern that we were close enough to touch their babies. Sadly, but understandably, it is a rule of the national park that you cannot touch the wildlife- unless it touches you! We also saw more sea lions and met a male and female land iguana.
The highlight of the third day was swimming with penguins, yes penguins, the only tropical penguins in the world! This was an unexpected experience, especially when one of the penguins took a liking to Mark, swimming around him and then nuzzling his hand. Mark has now taken an interest in all things penguin.
After lunch we went to see wild giant tortoises, it was a strange vision to see them roaming through a field of cows. Although we could get very close to the tortoises, they were slightly shy- they made a noise akin to Darth Vader and hid their heads
in their shells if we got too near! Nobody knows yet how long this animal’s life expectancy is, estimates go as high as two hundred years.
Day four was mainly spent cruising and enjoying the volcanic scenery. For a while we sat and watched the sea lion colony which had lots of tiny babies. The cutest thing that happened today was that a young sea lion fell asleep on Lorna’s foot! It seems we can’t get bored of these adorable creatures.
The fifth day brought more surprises when we saw albatrosses, including a number of over sized young and two adults performing their comical mating ‘dance’. We also found ourselves surrounded by marine iguanas and crabs when getting back onto the dinghy.
On the sixth day of our cruise, we were able to see some bright pink flamingos. The rest of the day was spent snorkelling around a volcanic crater. Here we swam alongside golden rays until rudely interrupted by a hump back whale and her calf! We quickly jumped back in the dinghy and followed the whales around, with remarkable views of both, getting as close as five metres. We did this until the mother began
to show concern by backflipping spectacularly out from the water.
Our penultimate day included a visit to the Charles Darwin Research Station, where they breed different species of giant tortoise and iguana. Here can be found baby tortoises and Lonesome George. The symbol of the Galapagos, poor old George is the last of his kind from Pinta.
Late afternoon we went on our last snorkellig trip. We jumped in over some spotted eagle rays. Following these allowed us to appreciate just what beautiful creatures they are. We were lucky enough to spend our last few minutes in the water playing alongside young sea lions, still Lorna’s favourite animal of the entire trip.
Before leaving this wonderful place, we went to Sea Lion Island where we saw a pup who had been born only hours before we arrived, with its mother still cleaning it.
We could both go on about the Galapagos Islands for an eternity, with the animals we haven’t been able to mention, such as Nazca boobies, pelicans, an octopus and countless tropical fish, making us both feel we will not be able to top this start to our trip! We were truly sad to
be leaving this place and cannot begin to explain its beauty.
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Sarah Inchley
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Boobies!
I like boobies too. But not the blue footed variety. I like my mummy's boobies. They are my favourite thing cause I love milk. Miss you both. Sarah Liz xxx