The End

Well, we are now back home (actually, I have already moved to Boston and am ready to start classes, and Mitch is busy in Guelph with frosh-week stuff...and the last few posts were written from Boston, not the Galapagos) but I wanted to round out our trip and describe the last 5 days, after our cruise ended.

The cruise ended on a Sunday morning. The rest of the group headed back to the airport, but Mitch and I headed into Puerto Ayora on Santa Cruz Island to our hotel. Although it didn't have TV, it was air-conditioned and had very hot water and two beds, so we were very happy. We stayed in Puerto Ayora Sunday to Wednesday, doing such things as napping, relaxing on the beach, eating a great meal in an expensive hotel (near the beach), sitting in restaurants watching soccer games on TV, hiking to a brine pool between two big rocks and swimming, renting mountain bikes to bike to a nearby beach but realizing that it was all uphill and much further than we though so hailing a cab to take us there....and then sitting in a cab for about 15 mintues and thanking God that we weren't still biking....We saw our first and last flamingo, and then navigated our way back to Baltra Island for our flight back to Guayaquil on Wednesday morning.

Mitch on our beach day:

Mitch at the entrance to the brine pool:

Mitch swimming in the brine pool (I joined him after taking this picture):

Mitch at the place we tried to bike to but then took the cab to:

Mitch and me in paradise:

Me with the flamingo:

When we arrived in Guayaquil we were met by Charlie, who is from Montanita and his parents own the bed and breakfast we were staying at. He took us around for the afternoon showing Mitch the highlights of Guayaquil since he hadn't seen them yet. Mitch wasn't feeling great though, and went to bed early. Jose Luis came from Montanita to meet us for a couple days, and he and I watched part of a big Ecuador soccer game at a bar and then went to a movie - GI Joe (it was terrible!).

The next day I decided to do some "normal people" things since I had already seen all of Guayaquil, so went with Jose Luis to see his family. Had a nice lunch with his mom and uncle, some good home cooking, and then went to the Zoo on the boardwalk of Guayaquil. Mitch went to a nearby beach, Playas, with Charlie. Thursday night was the last night of our trip, so we went to downtown Guayaquil and hiked up all those steps again....this was the third time for me but the first time for Mitch. We then went to a bar down at the bottom for a few drinks.

Jose Luis at the Guayaquil Zoo:

Mitch with Charlie and Jose Luis up at the top of the hill in Guayaquil on our last night:

Friday we wandered around the city, didn't do much of anything, packed up, ate dinner at TGIFs because Mitch was still feeling sick and wanted some American food, and headed to the airport to catch our 11pm flight.

What a trip!!!!!!

Galapagos Part VII

Saturday - Santa Cruz

In the morning we took a bus to Los Gemalos (The Twins). These are 2 big lava tube craters very close to each other. We hiked around and saw some birds. The Darwin woodpecker was popular with the ladies, but Mitch liked the Galapagos Dove the best. It has bright blue eyes.

Galapagos Dove:

We then mountain biked (mostly downhill thank goodness) to the main national park area where we could see land iguanas being bred. This is also the home of Lonely George, the last Giant Tortoise of his species. So far he has been unable to mate, which is very sad. Here we also learnt a lot about the islands formation, movement (they move 6-8 inches each year!!), and currents (there are 4 or 5, making each island a different temperature and home to different animals).

Me with yet another Giant Tortoise:

Mountain Biking (I could never work my gears properly, the expression on my face remained there the whole ride):

Mitch posing as a Giant Tortoise...better hope no real ones come looking for a mate...:

We then had some time to walk around the city. A very small fish market was a highlight, because there were so many different birds and sea lions all around trying to get some fish, and we could see them really close up.

Blue Footed Boobie up close and personal:

A hungry sea lion:

This was our last day on the cruise, and we spent one more night on the boat before the trip was over.

Galapagos Part VI

Friday - Isabela

After spending the night in a hotel we had nice breakfast (at the hotel) and returned to the boat to pick up our snorkel equipment. We took a bit of a tour around the shores of Isabela on the boat, and saw some penguins! At first we saw just two, and one was molting and one wasn't (the molting one was really ugly, see picture), and on the same rock were some blue footed boobies and sea lions...quite picturesque! Just a little while later we saw a whole bunch - maybe 15 - swimming. They look just like loons when they are swimming...Galapagos penguins are pretty small.

Penguins on shore:

Penguins swimming:

We then stopped for a hike at a dock where there is a trail that leads to the home of many, many marine iguanas. They were EVERYWHERE. We also saw a white tipped shark and many sea lions here.

Marine iguanas everywhere:

We next headed to the snorkel location where I fond a massive sting ray hiding under a ledge and a big lobster above it. Dario tried forever to catch the lobster but couldn't with his bare hands. There was very little coral here but a lot of pretty volcanic rock. We saw a sea turtle swimming in the water as we headed back on the snorkel boat to the catamaran.

We had a great cerviche on board for lunch, and then set sail for the afternoon back to Santa Cruz. We saw some Albatrosses from the boat while we were sailing - they spend their whole lives at sea and live only on Espanoal island. It was a real treat to see them! Also, a big manta ray jumped out of the water, and we spotted a whale, just once!

Sailing back, Emily in the captain's chair and Mitch hanging off the front of the boat:

Galapagos Part V

Thursday - Isabela

We spent 2 days on Isabela. Passengers are not allowed to sleep on the boats in the harbour (only crew is allowed to stay on the boat overnight) so the first thing we did in the morning was take our overnight bags to the hotel we were staying at. Although this was a surprise to us (our itinerary didn't say anything about a hotel) we were quite happy with the arrangement. Our hotel was very nice, and on the beachfront. More importantly, it had a huge bathroom with hot water, and Mitch and I each got our own beds. (Well, at first we had a matrimonial room, and the two parents had separate beds, but we traded.)

We then took a bus 30 minutes to the highlands to get to the biggest volcano around - Sierra Negra. Here, horses were waiting for us to take us further up. I was very excited about the horse ride. No cars are allowed up the volcano, so the options were horse or hiking, and since it is so high up it is quite wet and I was glad we weren't hiking. This quickly changed, however, as the horses walked SUPER slowly, so what we were told was a 30 min ride was well over an hour. It was also very slippery and muddy, with tons of ruts, so the horses kept stumbling and trying to walk up the edges of the path, which, although was smart on their part, meant that they were rubbing our legs into trees and shrubs and barbed wire. The horses also weren't very good listeners. The horse owner rode with us and kept making them go faster, but they would just run into a bunch so that your knee was up some other horse's ass. It was not enjoyable. Oh, and then Mitch's horse was kicking other horse's and our feet as well, and also biting other horses. It was really not enjoyable and totally terrifying. Mitch wants me to add here that his horse actually fell on the way up (and again on the way down) but that he managed to hold on, and that he actually enjoyed the ride because I swore the entire way up and he was laughing at me.

Here is a picture before we left on the horses:

At the top we had a beautiful view of the calderra which is the area around the opening of the volcano. The last activity of this volcano was 5 years ago, so you could see all the new black lava. We had a boxed lunch at the top and the top and then went for a hike in the volcano (the ladies stayed behind, requesting that we only take 30 minutes....we took much closer to 2 hours...) We were hiking in a part of the volcano known as Volcan Chico, and it was VERY hot. We were glad we were not there in the real summer months for Ecuador as it would have been unbearable. There were sulphur and iron deposits everywhere, causing it to be beautiful colours. There were no animals here at all.

Here is the view of the calderra:

Here are two pictures from the hike:

Here is what Mitch learnt about Isabela from Dario while the rest of us struggled to keep up and kept stopping for pictures: Isabela used to be 5 or 6 smaller islands, but because of the lava flow all of the islands joined together. It is now the biggest island. It is active about every 5 years, so next year they are expecting it to erupt again. The land is different colours, some green, some brown, and some black. Each colour corresponds to a different eruption. On top of one part of the volcano is the location of the highest point in the Galapagos - a 6 hour hike up.

We then had a long and miserable horse ride back down the volcano to the bus.

We went back to the hotel, had a walk on the beach, and walked around the town. There really wasn't a lot there. The best thing about the town was the street lamps that were made out of pieces of wood. We had dinner in town (I had a lovely cerviche and Mitch had shrimp) and then bumped into our crew and went to a nice beach bar at a hostal.

Galapagos IV (by Mitch)

Wednesday - Floreana

I have been instructed to start this blog post with the story of how grandma tilley got her name. It started with the first day of the trip, and both ladys came out of their rooms wearing these hats that looked a bit ridiculous considering it was very cloudy out. The had tight straps on that fastened to their chin the entire time. A conversation came up about their hats and the one lady got into the story of why she bought the hat. One of her friends was wearing the hat and was walking down a beach in an unknown place - i forget the name...Anyways her friend got robbed of everything he had that was in his pockets...but this tilley hat had a special pocket on the inside in which her friend was carrying $3000 in it, no one knows why he had that amount of money on him but we now know why the hat is so important...I wondered the entire trip whether or not grandma tilley kept her life savings in the top of her hat. Anyways both ladys wore the hat for the entire trip no matter where they went. Graham also had a hat exactly like theirs but refused to wear it because he thought that he would look like a 70 year old lady.

This morning was the captains birthday and the way to get everyone to know this is that he jumps off the boat into the water right after breakfast...soon the crew found out that emilys birthday was only a few days before so they made her jump in too. It was a nice start to the day i guess...

Anyways we got to Floreana and saw 8 levels of vegetation in just 400 meters. We started off by going to a Giant Tortise place where they look after tortises that used to be ex-pets. Babys use to ride the tortises for fun, people owned tortises like people own dogs back in the day. In the same area is where the main soure of water for the island is. The bucaneers came in the 1800s and carved water ways into the rock so it would all drip down into one location. I climbed to the top of where it dripped down, it tasted very good...also filled up my water bottle for the walk back. There was also a very cool section where people carved holes and slots in the rocks which they turned into homes...very large rocks and they had spots for doors, a kitchen area, bedrooms etc...There was also a large face carved into the rocks with plants growing out of the top like hair. Awesome from the other side of the rocks. We then came back to the boat for a light lunch of a variety of fruits and cheese balls and fried fish. Two trips then went out, one to la loberia where the tide was strong, and another one to playa negra...the ladys obviously went to playa negra to stare at birds and reptiles. We walked to la loberia which was about 1 km and jumped off rocks into the water to start snorkeling. About 2 minutes into the snorkeling there were massive sea turtles swimming an arms length away...There must have been over 20 throughout the afternoon, the guide said he had never seen this many before so we were very lucky.

Half way through the snorkel i looked over at em and a sea lion was following her..She pointed it out to me and i continued to swim over...then she continued to swim and the sea lion followed her. The sea lion started to blow bubbles under her and she could feel them...then all of a sudden it got behind her and bit down on her flipper..i was watching this entire thing happen, but wasnt sure if the sea lion was playing or was hungry...Anyways once it latched onto emilys flipper she looked back and she said all she saw were these teeth and two eyes looking at her...again she panicked, started screaming, and kicked her way free...she swam all the way over to the guide who looked at her again like she was a retarded snorkeler. Anyways the sea lion swam away peacefully, i think that it just wanted to play but emily had a freak attack...very funny to see from a distance. We then finished the snorkeling and headed to playa negra to join the ladys for an hour or two. It was a very nice black sandy beach but was too tired to continue to swim so just lay there and had a siesta. Emily really didnt want to go to the beach and was trying desperatly to get back to the boat (for internal reasons) but everyone had to leave together so she had to pucker up and sit on the beach (i think the fruit worked her). We then headed back to the boat to shower and played quarante (an ecuadorian card game) with the crew; although they were trying to explain to us how to play in spainish it was very hard to understand...Still dont know if i won or lost. After everyone was ready we went back to land for an amazing BBQ of fish, chicken, and carne. I must of ate about 4 piece of chicken, 2 carne, and 3 fish...with rice and salads..also had birthday cake to celebrate emily and the captains birthday, very good...Emily salsaed with some of the crew members and this was also where we found out that grandma tilley could dance very well...someone asked how she was so good and it was because she was a BELLY DANCER back in her prime time day. You can now picture grandma tilley shaking her ass in shorts while dancing with the crew members..it was a site to see. Pictures and video were taken. We then headed back to the boat and I passed out from all the food and cervezaaaa...very good day.



The turtles chomping away on almuerzo (lunch)
Mitch drinking the fresh water from the rock crevices.

Emily posing with a giant tortise, see later posting for her posing as a tortise.

Mitch holding on to the first class bus we took up the mountain, we then rode on top of it on the way home, causing sore backs, and bruised ass cheeks.

Galapagos Part III

Tuesday - San Cristobal

Yesterday was a water day, so today was a land day. After another good breakfast we took a 30 min bus ride to El Junco Park. It was very misty and muddy there, something that will become a theme for all our highlands activities. We hiked about half a kilometer uphill (at least Dario said it was 500m, who knows how far it was). The Grandmas had a really hard time making it up the hill...they were way behind the group and finally appeared covered in mud from head to toe, including their glasses, from slipping and sliding and falling...it was pretty funny, they were really good sports about it! (A few other people fell too, and all our shoes were disgusting by the end of it.)

At the top there was a small weather station, (really small) and that was about all we could see for all the fog. There was a lake / lagoon up there, which is the only source of fresh water for the whole island, as well as several of the other islands. We walked around it. Only one grandma (Grandma Tilly) came with us. She made it almost all the way around, then turned around to go back the way we came, thinking that she was less than half way....Graham had to go running after her to get her to come the right way.

We then took a bus to La Galapaguera, a Giant Tortise Breeding Area. Many many tortises were killed in the Galapagos many years ago, and they are still trying to restore the population. Here they breed Middle Sadle Giant Tortises, which are those native to San Cristobal (each island has its own kind). This kind is the 4th largest in the world. They are really big - up to 200 kg!! We got to see two tortises fight, here, which was very lucky! We spent quite a bit of time observing these tortises.

We also saw the area where they keep the babies until they are big enough to survive on their own. In the 5 years the center has been open, they have only gotten 20 babies. They keep the babies until they are 5 to 10 years old then release them back to their natural habitat. They might keep a couple to continue the breeding program.

We got back on the bus to go to a nice lookout point for our boxed lunch. Then we headed to the beach. There were two sealions waiting for us in the middle of the beach...one was nursing. Mitch swam a bit, and we relaxed in the sun. While relaxing Darwin Finches decided to nip at Mitch´s toes!

We went back to the main city, Puerto Baquerizo Morero for a short stroll, but there wasn´t much there. We took the dingy back to the boat, as always, and the Grandmas sat across from eachother and held hands so they wouldn´t fall off. We were only going 5 km an hour! I couldn´t look at Mitch because every time I saw his face I started to laugh hysterically.

Back on the boat Mitch decided to take a shower....and halfway through the crew decided to change the batteries that power the water...so he was covered in soap. He must have spent 20 min in teh shower (no hot water) for about 2 min of water...as he always says he gets the short end of the stick. He says he froze his balls off.

We had a good dinner of cauliflower pie and meat, with pudding for dessert. We were both very tired by 7 30 but Mitch stayed up until 9 to watch us pull away from the port...We were expecting another very bumpy night...

To be continued!

Here is Mitch on the beach in the afternoon:


Here is Mitch with the nursing sea lions on the beach in the afternoon:



Here are two Giant Tortises fighting, in the morning:

Here is Mitch and I overlooking the lagoon in El Junco, in the morning:

Here is Mitch at the entrance to El Junco:

Galapagos Part II (by Mitch)

Emily´s Note: I am trying to upload pictures to go with Mitch´s posting, but for some reason I can´t move them around right now....so all the pictures are up here, and you will have to keep reading to figure out what they are of! ]Also, I can´t figure out how to turn them around...sorry!

Here is Kicker Rock, where we went snorkling:

Here is Mitch and the ladies before snorkling, on the catamaran:

Here is a shot of our boat:

Here is a picture of a marine iguana. I think it might be fuzzy but I can´t tell on this computer. It was actually from Sunday:

Monday - San Cristobal Island

After getting only a couple hours of sleep because of the massive waves that rocked our boat, and the tight sleeping area it was time for breakfast. We had a great start with chocolate cereal, papaya and a good cup of coffee, probably the best i have had in ecuador..followed by an omelet, toast, cheese, and juice. Today we were going snorkeling so everyone got a wetsuit because the water is a bit cold this time of year. The first one they gave me barely fit and my balls were in my stomach again as i put it on so i told the crew member that this wasnt going to work and i would bare the cold, but luckily he found a bigger one somewhere. I am glad he did because the water was cold without one...

We then took the dingy into land, and then from land took a faster boat that had 300 horsepower to isla loba for snorkeling..Before our snorkeling adventure the two older ladys we were with were very excited to come snorkeling, on the boat when the guide said to get ready they took about 30 minutes in their room..finally they both walk out, decked out to the max in the newest snorkeling equipment possible, their flippers were made in Italy and they even had fog liquid for their mask...Other items were a TWO wet suits, feet warmers, hand warmers, A floatation device that had a plastic clearing in it because one of the ladys could not put her head in a mask and underwater, this floatation device also had a whistle on it - god knows why anyone would need to blow a whistle while using this...Please see picture attatched with me and the ladys, i had to get one..They also wore hats and layered on a ton of sun tan lotion, even though it was not sunny...and also had neck coverings. All the passengers hoped in the water and started swimming away from the boat...I looked back and saw the ladys get into the water a very slow pace..i think they thought it was too cold...I continued on my snorkeling and looked back 5 minutes later and both the ladies were back on the boat..I checked with them after why they got back on so fast and they said that they had seen enough...haha why the hell they bought all the gear for 5 minutes of snorkeling is beyond me, the best part was that one of the ladies put her hot tub to 72 degrees before the trip to try on all her equipment to make sure she was warm enough...anyways we have been laughing about it ever since...

The boat arrived at isla lobas which had sea turtles, a ton of fish, coral, crystal clear water, and of course sea lions...This was our first encounter with sea lions in the water...Our guide said to us before the snorkeling that if a male sea lion ( a lot bigger then females and had a big head) approaches you it is because they want to bite you and are protecting their children and wife. So we get in the water and everything is going well...We approach two female sea lions that are just out of the water looking at us and there is a male that is in the water infront of the females...Everyone is looking at the male from a distance but doze ball emily has her head above water asking the guide where the male is..At this time the male starts swimming directly at emily, and everyone is watching this as this happen except for emily...Emily finally puts her mask back under water only to be face to face with the male sea lion...she immediately gets into a panick and starts screaming and tries to grab the guide for help who is next to her...the guide thinks she is a psycho and tells her it is not a big problem...anyways it was damn funny to see her freak out..the snorkeling then continued as i swam around with a female sea lion and one of the babys which was very fun..hopefully the underwater pictures turn out.

We then got back onthe boat and went to Kicker Rock which is probably one of the biggest and most beautiful rock I have seen. Very cool shape. Here there was beautiful coral, manta rays, star fish (blue, red, yellow), lots of fish, jelly fish, turtles, baby sea lions that swam right up to your mask. Very cool. After snorkeling we got back on the boat for snacks and headed to a private beach for lunch and to relax..very good lunch of shrimp and brown rice. Walked around the beach for a bit and had a little siesta...The ladys did their bird hunting and reptile hunting which you will hear more about later on..Got back on boat to tour around some of the smaller islands which had red footed bobbys, maksed boobys, blue footed boobys, friggate birds mating, and many other cool things.

The power boat then took us back to the port where we got on the dingy to go back to our main boat..I had the honour of rideing in the dingy with one of the ladys and not only did she wear one, but TWO life jackets on the way to our boat...I asked her if she thought that the dingy might flip (even though it was going 5 mph) and then she claimed she forgot she had two life jackets on...how you can forget that is beyond me...anyways it was another good laugh...

Got back on the boat had pizza and a tripcal drinking waiting for us...Then got in the shower, which are very small and cold, but they get the job done...luckily we didnt get screwed into the room at the back of the boat because their shower was ontop of the toliet...They werent happy when they found out that we had a shower with a curtain and a toliet and sink. Their sink was their shower head...I guess they had no problem pissing in the shower though..unfortunatly their toliet paper got very wet haha. Slept on the boat this night but was still in the port so actually got some sleep...That is all for day 2 on the boat...more to come...I am writing this from the hotel so i am enjoying the hot water showers and my own bed!