One day trip we did from coastal Ecuador was Isla de la Plata. Our hostel set us up with a tour, and we headed to the nearby town of Puerto Lopez to board a boat. We were told that we might get so see whales on our way to the island, but that the mating season was coming to an end, so we might not. Let's just say we got lucky!
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| From Coastal Ecuador |
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| From Coastal Ecuador |
We also got a glimpse of some dolphins, but were unable to get them on camera. When we finally got to the island, we hiked for a couple hours and got our first look at the blue footed boobies.
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| From Coastal Ecuador |
We found it especially amusing when the birds would set up their nests in the middle of the tourist path!
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| From Coastal Ecuador |
We also got a look at the masked booby (one of my favorites):
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| From Coastal Ecuador |
The last bird we saw was the frigate bird (the male is puffing out):
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| From Coastal Ecuador |
After the hike, we went back to the boat and did about 30 minutes of snorkeling. This photo is from the boat before we jumped in and went swimming with the fishes...
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| From Coastal Ecuador |
Overall, we enjoyed the Isla de la Plata experience! If Galapagos is too expensive or time-consuming, this is a great alternative. It is especially great if you can go during whale mating season (I know September is included, but I don't know how much earlier it goes).
After our stay on the coast, we boarded an overnight bus to Quito. As usual, we didn't sleep much, but we eventually made it. Here we found our staple Quito hotel, Hotel Pickett. We settled in a bit here, and then headed for the jungle, which Carrie detailed in her most recent post.
After the jungle, we had a couple days in Quito before we headed for the Galapagos. We decided to head to Mitad del Mundo, or the "Middle of the World", where the true equator is located. First, there was the large monument, which actually isn't at the true equator:
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| From Quito, Ecuador |
After that, we headed to the Museo del Solar, which had the true equator:
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| From Quito, Ecuador |
At this museum, they had a demonstration of water draining in different hemispheres. Carrie and I of course decided to take videos:
At the equator:
In the southern hemisphere (only a couple meters away):
In the northern hemisphere (also a couple meters away):
At the equator, Carrie succeeded at balancing an egg on a nail (due to the fact that there are no sideways gravitational forces):
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| From Quito, Ecuador |
After the Mitad del Mundo, we got incredibly lost on our bus ride back to Quito, so after trying 4 different local buses, we eventually gave up and took a cab. Remarkably, it turned out we had gotten to only a few blocks from our hotel! After that, we got ready to head to the GALAPAGOS!!
A quick note on Galapagos planning: We booked our trip before we headed to the jungle, or about 1 week in advance, in Quito. We paid our travel agent IN CASH, which resulted in many trips to the ATM! With Galapagos, if you have the luxury of time, I do recommend booking your tour "last minute," since that's when the prices drop more, even for nice boats. For truly last minute bookings, you can actually fly to the town of Puerto Ayora in the Galapagos, and book right then! We had booked our tour on a "tourist superior" boat, which basically had small bedrooms with private bathrooms, decent food, transit to the islands, and not much else. When we got back from the jungle, we found out that our original boat had been canceled, and we were re-booked on a nicer, first class boat for the same price!
Our travel agent told us that the boats reserve seats on airplanes so that all of the tourists can fly together. We were given stickers with our boat's name, so we could easily find our guide and group when we landed. However, in the airport, we didn't notice other people wearing our stickers. Our plane was then delayed, and we ended up boarding a plane with a different flight number, which took us to Guayaquil. From there, we switched planes to a Galapagos bound plane, although everything was extremely confusing. Carrie and I suspected that they canceled our original flight, but just wouldn't admit that they did.
When we finally got off our plane, we didn't see anyone from our boat. Suddenly, this older man came up to us and told us that he was the one to take us to the boat, but that we were very late and the entire group was waiting! We told him that we needed to get our bags, and then we'd be all set. While we waited for our bags, he came back up to us and said he was leaving with the rest of the group! We were left behind, and told to join this other group to go to the port, where he would meet us and take us to our boat. Of course, the guide of the group we joined didn't have money to pay for our bus / boat transfers, so we had to pay them ourselves, which was unexpected.
Once we got to the port, the old man rejoined us, and introduced us to our actual tour guide. The guide proceeded to tell us that this was supposed to be his afternoon off, and joined us on a water taxi to our boat. On the boat, the rest of our group had just finished lunch, and Carrie and I ate our meal while they finished off dessert. Luckily, the rest of our group was extremely friendly and understanding, and things got better fast.
What we ended up learning was that in the Galapagos, the logistics can be completely messed up, but nothing can screw up the islands themselves... the rest of the trip was pretty fantastic! After lunch on the first day, we went to the Charles Darwin Center, where they are breeding endangered Galapagos tortoises:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
After the Darwin Center, we headed back to the boat for dinner and sleeping. The next day, we went back to the same island we had started in and viewed some lava tubes and did a short hike. After lunch, the boat left for the first time and we went to the Island of Santa Fe for snorkeling and a hike. I don't have photos of snorkelling, but we saw some colorful fish, and Carrie had a sea lion swim directly underneath her! When we got to the beach, we were introduced to the Galapagos sea lions for the first time:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
Needless to say, we enjoyed ourselves quite a bit! The incredible thing was that the animals were mostly unafraid of humans! This is likely due to the fact that the islands have been protected for so long, so humans haven't bothered the animals much here... only taken lots of photos!
For the third day, we went to Española island, where we saw more amazing things. Here are some highlights:
Marine Iguanas and Lava Lizards:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
I join a beautiful moment between mother and child:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
Carrie and I at the edge of the island:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
Masked boobies up close:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
A sea lion joins Carrie on the beach:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
For Day 4, we headed to Floreana Island, which featured some good snorkelling that proved to be difficult due to the strong current. We also got our first look at Galapagos flamingos (supposedly the most pink in the world), a beach full of stingrays, and more sea lions!
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
Notice the flamingo's path visible in the water:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
Luckily the rays didn't give anyone the Steve Irwin treatment:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
We liked this pose:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
On Day 5 in the early morning, we got our first look (in the Galapagos) at the male frigatebird showing off for the females:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
We also got a look at a newborn sea lion with its mother, and a bird attempting to eat the placenta. The mother had to keep growling to keep the bird at bay:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
Unfortunately, during day 5, the boat spent a long time at Baltra, the airport island. This is because some tourists opt for 4 or 5 day Galapagos tours, and those tourists are mixed in with the 8 day people (like us). For the 8 day people, we basically had to kill 6 hours of a beautiful afternoon doing nothing, because they were dropping off and picking up tourists, as well as cleaning the boat. After some coaxing, at least they let us hang out on an army beach for a couple hours, which wasn't particularly exciting, so Carrie built this fortress around a sleeping sea lion:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
For Day 6, we headed to Genovesa Island. It was here that we got our first look at the red-footed booby:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
The very beautiful red footed booby with white feathers:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
The swallow-tailed gull (one standing on top of the other):
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
This day also featured some great snorkeling, where we saw SHARKS and giant turtles. Unfortunately, I do not have photos.
For Day 7, we spent time in Bartolome, as well as Santa Cruz's Black Turtle Cove. Here we saw the Galapagos Penguin:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
We also had some nice views (you can see our boat in the background):
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
Bartolome also featured one of our unforgettable moments, when we snorkeled with sea lions! We had snorkeled before and had sea lions swim by, but this time the sea lions actually swam WITH us and really seemed to be playing with us. They would do barrel rolls and jump out of the water, and even pose underwater. While we don't have any photos of this, I doubt I will ever forget it.
In the afternoon of day 7, we moved to a different area of Santa Cruz. While in transit, two frigate birds followed us for the entire time! Notice how happy I look at this moment:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
I was lounging on the boat's top deck, when suddenly one of the frigate birds that had been following us decided to relieve itself:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
I cleaned up, and for our afternoon excursion we went in small boats through some mangroves, reminiscent of the jungle. We saw some pretty neat stuff.
Mating turtles:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
SHARKS!
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
Turtle underwater:
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| From Galapagos Isl... |
On Day 8, we did a brief (and fairly uneventful) hike before heading back to the airport. In summary, I would HIGHLY recommend the Galapagos to anyone who loves wildlife. If you have the luxury of time, I would certainly recommend the 8 day tour, booked in Ecuador. Just make sure you have something to do midway through the trip when the 4/5 day passengers switch. Also, get the nicest boat you can afford, since you'll be spending a lot of time on it! We took a lot more pictures than were posted on this blog, so please feel free to look at the full photo albums if you like what you see.
1 comment:
again, great post!
a bird pooped on me yesterday afternoon, but it was a pigeon, and it was not nearly as cool.
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