Dec 19 and 20
We began our Galapagos tour on Isla San Cristobal – a two hour / 1000 km flight from the mainland of Ecuador. On arrival we wandered through the town of Puerto Baquerizo Moreno and we were delighted by the sea lions lounging randomly on the beachfront, seemingly oblivious to the passing pedestrians and playing children.
The company we were travelling with (ROW Adventures out of Idaho) is one of the few with permits to camp on the Galapagos. This is one of the main reasons we opted to do a ‘land-based’ tour instead of the far more common cruise boat-based tours. Another reason for our choice was the variety of activities included – kayaking, hiking, snorkelling, eating in local restaurants and staying in local hotels. Our group was small – a couple from Atlanta, another couple from San Francisco, our guide Eduardo and us. The Galapagos is 97% national park so we were also escorted by national park guides/ interpreters on all our excursions –a different one on each of the islands we visited.
Our first kayak adventure was a short excursion out of Puerto Baquerizo Moreno along the west coast of the island travelling toward our campsite for the next two days. We only kayaked for about an hour and a half before transferring to a catamaran for another hour’s travel. (Our kayaks were towed the rest of the way by another support boat.) Our camp was all set up and waiting for us on a lovely sandy beach at a place known as Puerto Grande. We watched a stunning sunset, glass of wine in hand and enjoyed a great dinner. I didn’t sleep very well that night. Every time I woke up just a little bit I was jolted awake by the knowledge that I was camped on the Galapagos. It was ridiculously exciting.
The next day we set out from camp in our kayaks and paddled for about 3 hours. The only sign of other people was a small cruise ship way off in the distance. We wound up at place called Isla Lobos where we saw marine iguanas for the first time. There was also a colony of sea lions. As we snorkelled the young sea lions circled us, swimming close to see if we were something to play with. It was hilarious!
Video of swimming with sea lions...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sg5CYWWJoI
After our swim we transferred to the catamaran and headed to our next stop - Kicker Rock. This island is a sheer-walled tuff cone (formed from volcanic ash) that has been eroded in half. The water around Kicker Rock is very deep and attracts many species not usually found in shallower water. We geared up for another snorkel and the catamaran left us to swim through the gap. Our guide Jorge recited the names of various shark species we might see just before we jumped overboard including “if we were REALLY lucky”, a hammerhead. Whew! Turns out we were extremely lucky because we saw three! As you can imagine, it was a little unsettling to see them pass about 15 feet below us. Jorge was thrilled. He hadn’t seen one there for several years and he’d never seen three at once. I was just bewildered.
We had another lovely evening back at our camp – more wine, another spectacular sunset and a full moon. The main activity of the evening was to make the underwater signal for hammerhead and laugh at our good fortune.
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