I've been thinking for a long time how I'm gonna write this post (along with both dreading and looking forward to it), as an even greater proportion than usual of the content is just photos. This blog seems to be becoming more and more a photoblog, which I don't mind, so I'll just roll with it, and intersperse the photos with explanation and stories as they arise or are necessary.
I hadn't really considered going to the Galapagos as part of this trip, but starting in Colombia I started meeting people that'd gone there or who were planning to. All of those who had been there that I spoke to acknowledged that it was expensive as fuck, but no-one recommended not going, assuming one could afford the trip.
In the end I decided to go on a tour/cruise, as I wanted to make the most of the whole thing, and wasn't sure how worthwhile it'd be to go independently. I'm still not really sure about that, I think I've only spoken to one person who went on his own, and he loved it. He did stay for something crazy like 40 days though. The tour I booked was for 8 days on a 50-ish foot yacht called the Merak, one of the cheapest boats available. I didn't even look at prices for the more luxury boats (I believe there's 3 "classes;" the Merak was "economic," and some of the other boats we saw were ridiculously huge cruise ships, full of sexagenarians and over).
So, after a really early start to catch our flight (even at 6am the traffic in Quito was stupid - any Aucklander who complains about traffic doesn't know shit), we finally arrived on Isla Baltra, and were met by the boat's captain (who didn't introduce himself as such, and I don't think he even introduced himself at all while we were there. Economy class all the way), who put us on a bus to the dock the Merak was anchored near to. There wasn't quite enough space on the dinghy to take everyone in one load, so I was left on the pier with the crates of food to go across on the second trip. Then we loaded the food and myself onto the dinghy, and began to go to the yacht, a journey of maybe 500m. The outboard broke, and wouldn't start, so we got towed out to the boat by another dinghy.
Then the economy class really kicked in. While we were getting settled in and introducing ourselves and so on, the outboard on the dinghy literally caught fire spontaneously. I don't think the crew understood or believed at first when we said it was on fire (they didn't speak English; the guide did, but he wasn't a regular on the boat) until I said "no, seriously, there's a lot of smoke." Then they got out there with the fire extinguisher:
Good start. But, we were all backpackers, not rich old tourists, so no pasó nada (there's so many things that just fit in Spanish that're hard to translate. Basically we didn't give a shit as long as they sorted it out).
The yacht motored to the first stop we were to make, for a short walk on one of the islands. Sadly, as with the journey from Panama to Colombia, there was basically no wind the entire time of the cruise, so we always traveled under engine power). The crew had to radio to get a dinghy from another boat to ferry us to the island, as they'd arranged for a new motor (or parts, I never quite worked it out) to be delivered to where we were to sleep that night.
When we got to the island, I finally saw for myself what everyone that'd visited the Galapagos had told me: there are animals everywhere, and they don't give two shits about your presence. We probably spent half the time on this particular island just taking photos of sealions, of which there were hundreds, along with the frigatebirds, which I assume were in heat, or season, or whatever one says about birds that're down for some breeding.
Ladies? These are either magnificent or great frigatebirds (according to wiki, I dunno if our guide ever told us), and when it's the breeding season the males certainly look magnificent and maybe great.
Most of the islands were basically deserts. Cactus, sticky trees and not much else. Almost every single Pacific Island was settled by the time more modern European explorers came around with their fancy navigational aids and whatnots, but there was no permanent settlement on the Galapagos, because there's no reason to permanently settle. For one, there's no fresh water. Apparently there was basically no conflict over which of the new powers would gain control over the islands because they were seen as worthless, and in the end they were basically given to Ecuador due to their proximity. These days, there's around 25,000 people living on the islands, across 5 of the islands.
Frigate chick.
Patchwork iguana. I've no idea how their skin gets like that.
Wee lizard that was probably smaller than the iguanas' tails.
The first blue-footed booby we saw.
Sealions seem to spend most of their time basking in the sun on the beach. Good life.
You can get pretty close to most of the wildlife, but this guy got a bit of a shock when I plopped myself down.
Iguana tracks.
Baws iguana.
After our walk, we went and parked up between 2 islands to sleep. Sunset was nice:
My memory of exactly what we did in the next few days is hazy and I'm too lazy to look through my diary and find out. Basically we spent our time sleeping/motoring around, walking on an island, snorkeling, or motoring around and baking in the equatorial sun.
Poor sealion :(
This guy was so far from the water, and they're just as uncoordinated on land as you'd expect.
Apparently making your breastfeeding pics publicly available is ok these days, though I have no fucking idea why you'd wanna exhibit them.
Peek-a-boo.
More sealions far from their sea, who seemed like they were on a mission to return.
I assume these rocks've been worn smooth by thousands of years of furry blubber.
Our guide was pretty good at speaking sealion (juvenile and mature), and had to yell at this guy a bit so we could get to the dingy.
This is the first place we snorkeled. Dat water. It was maybe 5m deep, and we saw a bunch of Galapagos and white/grey-tipped reef sharks chilling on the bottom, along with a turtle or 2, but the highlight for me was freediving a lil and playing in the water with a baby sealion. So good.
I think he was scratching himself.
I believe this is the cheeky kid that was chasing us around the beach. We were just standing around when suddenly he starts running at me, so I ran away in shock. He'd run a few metres, then stop and catch his breath, then chase someone else. After a while I asked the guide what'd happen if we stopped running and let him catch us. He showed us a bite-shaped scar on his shin.
I imagine sealions are pretty soft, so they'd make a decent mattress.
Swag.
Galapagos hawk.
This place is called Kicker Rock, and was probably the best place we snorkeled. Lots of sharks, though mostly quite deep, so I had to push my rather low freediving limits to see them well. Saw a bunch of sea turtles, and I still can't work out how they swim so quickly so effortlessly (they barely move, but they fly through the water). Also kind of cool was a bunch of different small jellyfish, which all had little neon lights on the sides, some of which you could poke with your finger to make them phosphoresce. Despite all the other cool stuff, I probably spent more time just staring at the jellyfish in front of my face. It was the ones you couldn't see that stung though :/
Iguana nest.
Some I-don't-recall-what bones.
Our boat, the Merak.
Galapagos hawk.
Poor bebe turtle.
We went for a walk along this beach, and mostly saw sealions sleeping.
There was also hermit crabs.
Trying out the sealion lifestyle.
These guys ran around and on the sealions eating flies and such.
Nigel No-mates sleeping in a turtle nest back from the shore.
Whenever one slapped a fly or something, at least 2 to either side would wobble too.
Turtle tracks.
The Merak on the blue, blue water.
Babies playing in the surf while momma sleeps.
An ugly birdling.
N'aww
Palo santo (sacred stick) trees.
I sat and watched this thing for too much time...
King of his little castle.
Nice little pool, though inaccessible and unsuitable for swimming in anyway due to the surf.
Sealion lying around blowing bubbles.
Marine iguana! Lizards swimming has to be one of the weirder things I've seen, but they needa get them their algaes.
We spent maybe a day and a half moored in the harbour of the largest settlement on the Galapagos, Puerto Ayora, home of ~12,000.
Sealion waiting for scraps at the fish market. Just out of shot to the left: "Do not feed the wildlife" sign.
One of the main reasons we visited Puerto Ayora was to go to the Charles Darwin Research Station, formerly the home of Lonesome George, the last of his subspecies. The main tourist component of the Station is the tortoise breeding programme, which is one of several in operation on the islands. Before these programmes were started, many of the subspecies (each island has their own subspecies, and crossbreeds are infertile) were close to extinction due to introduced predators and human consumption. One can imagine early explorers and pirates seeing these big, slow, defenseless morsels of meat and rejoicing. Apparently they can survive up to a year with no food or water, making them ideal to be taken alive and stacked in a ship's hold.
"Eggs are collected from nests in the field and brought to the Breeding Centre, where they are kept in incubators for 120-150 days.
The tortoises' sex is determined by the temperature during incubation. Eggs incubated at a temperature of 29.5°C become females and those incubated at 28°C becomes males."
The ratio of females:males is roughly 7:3, and each animal has its shell numbered, with different colours of numbering representing the different islands the eggs were taken from, so the grown tortoise can be returned to its parent population.
Bebe tortoises. These (mostly) gals were probably smaller than my hand.
Slightly bigger tortoise (needs more familiar stuff for scale...)
Getting bigger. I assume not long after this stage they were released back in to the wild, as the next biggest ones I have photos of are fully grown:
Havin a nap.
There was also some fiery-looking iguanas at the Station.
And a much smaller lizard or two.
These guys were all crossbreeds I believe, and therefore unable to breed.
They all look so ancient.
These two got up at the same time and had a wee footrace.
There was quite a few little paintings and things of Darwin around the place. Taken after visiting the Station.
Crazy iguanas thinking they're geckos.
For the first half of our trip the boat had borrowed a sailor from a much fancier boat. He told us he prefers working on the fancier boat because there's more clients and therefore more towels with which he can make sculptures every day. He was missed when he went back to his boat.
In the afternoon we went and visited a ranch which wild tortoises pass through. Puerto Ayora's island, Santa Cruz, has a resident population of tortoises, who undertake a small migration each year based on the rains. I can't remember the logic behind it, but when we were there they were around this particular ranch; if we were there earlier or later I assume we would've visited a different one.
There was a couple of these around. When dry, they weighed around 10-15kg.
We also went inside a volcanic tunnel at the ranch. Basically all the Galapagos were formed by volcanic activity. In some places, it's more obvious than others. I believe this was several kilometres long, and was formed by the top of a lava flow setting while the magma continued to flow underneath, then draining out before it could set. Then the same thing happened, and again, and again.
All the lights in the tunnel had their own little spot of greenery.
Tortoise having lunch. Their diet is basically fruit and grass.
Someone got a little close...
Messy motherfucker eating a half-rotten papaya.
Though much of their diet is grass, obviously tortoises aren't as well set-up as ruminants to process it. They take the chlorophyll and shit out the rest.
Apparently you can basically count the rings like a tree, but after 50ish years they're too worn to count and all you can say is "he's probably between 50 and 100."
They were reasonably solitary creatures.
And didn't care about our human "borders."
I thought this was pretty clever. Vestuario means wardrobe, and Vs and Bs are pronounced the same by most Spanish speakers.
And then we continued our voyage to a few other islands, starting with this gal and her stony red beach:
This guy was all alone when we arrived and left. Either his mum came back, or he's probably dead :(
Cactus flower!
Not sure if these are flowers, but more cactus flowers!
Around this point our guide told us about "Project Judas," which is too genius to not mention. Basically when Europeans first started coming to the Galapagos they brought a whole bunch of animals that didn't belong, like when they arrived everywhere in the world. Among these animals were goats. Apparently on one of the islands there was like 3 goats, and then when a census was done however many years later, there was over 200,000. So in the early 00's the Peruvian government started this project, where they'd catch one male goat, paint his horns red, inject him with goat pheromones, give him a GPS collar, and let him loose on his island. Then they come in with a helicopter and a few guys with rifles. On one island alone they killed over 200,000 goats this way, and they're mostly gone from all the islands they want them gone from (there're a couple of islands where the residents use goats for their livelihoods).
This island was called "Sombrero chino." Should be able to work out what that means.
Then we saw Galapagos penguins! We also saw them a few times in the water, but they were impossible to keep up with despite their appearance of effortlessness.
This was a sealion, I believe.
Little lava tunnel on one of the islands.
You can kinda see the layers of lava here. The fat one on the top is the most recent lava flow, and the thin one just below is the layer of sea junk (sand and molluscs and such) that were on the previous lava layer when the volcano erupted again.
Seashells trapped in the lava.
On another island we walked around a pretty huge plateau of lava, which is around 100 years old. The whole thing was pretty surreal, with broken rolling mounds of black going off into the distance. Even after 100 years the only life is a few plants, which is still reasonably impressive considering how bleak it is.
Mineral coloration of the lava.
There were a bunch of these around the place. They pretty much looked like metal and were globs that landed later on the surface.
After walking around on the lava, we had a wee snorkel then went over to climb up to a lookout. God it was hot...
Old crater in the centre underwater.
View from the lookout. Our guide didn't know why it was green in the middle, some weird effect of the conditions I suppose. We landed in the beach on the right and walked to the beach on the left, which was basically covered in turtle nests (and a dead pufferfish with a few hungry crabs...)
After checking out the turtle nests, we had our last snorkel of the trip, which was one of the coolest. There was 5 Galapagos sharks hanging out in a little cave underwater, which didn't seem inclined to move when we went down to see them and take photos (including a few selfies, of course). Afterwards 5 or 6 penguins swam past, providing a nice close for our swimming antics.
The following morning we had one last walk before we went back to the airport. Our guide said in 8 years of doing tours he'd never seen a turtle nesting. But we did. We stood and watched her for a while, as she alternated between appearing idle and flapping her flippers backwards to cover the eggs behind her:
The main purpose of visiting this beach was the chance of seeing flamingos, which are occasionally in one of two pools. One of the pools was empty, and the other contained this guy alone. Which was also apparently reasonably lucky, as there's normally either thousands or none.
The Galapagos Park Service, or whatever they're called, monitors turtle nests on many islands, and there was a guy wandering around these ones with a clipboard.
On our way back to the pickup point the soon-to-be-mother was making her way back to the sea. I imagine she was exhausted, as she was going agonisingly slowly. Again with the sitting still for a while, and then one flap of the flippers to go forward maybe 10cm.
She made it eventually though!
And then on the way back to the yacht we saw these two going at it. This was also unusual as there's normally also 5 or 6 other males circling around nipping at the guy. We may have committed the most heinous of cockblocks on this poor guy, or he might've been done.
This guy was chilling in the shade while we were waiting for our bus to the airport.
I hope you enjoyed my copious photos (and there's copious more where they came from), and maybe learnt a few things. When I got back to Quito I didn't really know what to do next, so just hung out for a while and made a couple of unsuccessful attempts to finish writing the blog post about Cali.
And that's what I have to say about that. Also, go to the Galapagos if you get the chance, it's not gonna get any better as time goes on.
