Stacey’s 30th Birthday Extravaganza

One of the gemelas…large sinkhole

The first 24 hours in the Galapagos Islands were interesting and relaxing at the same time but of course, it wouldn’t be a trip without a little mishap.  After dinner in the evening of Day 2, my English roommate Claire:

and I were just starting to think about heading to our cabin for the night as the seas were rough and we had a 5 to 6 hour journey ahead of us as Nemo II was headed toward the distant Isabela Island.  Claire and I were sitting in the dining area with several other passengers and our tour guide Juan Carlos when a huge wall of water splashes over all of us coming from the direction of my and Claire’s cabin.  For a few seconds, we were all paralyzed wondering what happened (and I was having flashbacks to the movie Titanic) when the second wall of water struck and Juan Carlos sprung into action…shouting to the capitan to slow down.  As it turns out, there is a port hole/hatch-type windown underneath the steps leading into our cabin that looks like this (picture taken at night so the water looks dark):

It seems that the last time it was closed it was not closed properly and the strength of the waves on the choppy seas blew out the window and thus soaking us and everything on our beds in the cabin.  Fortunately for me I had nothing on my bed but clothes and other dryeable items but poor Claire had her brand new SLR camera without its case sitting on the bed.  I’ll bet you can imagine where I’m going with this.  So…two weeks, two roommates, two cameras ruined by water.  I must be some sort of jinx.

The crew tried valiantly but the window could not be sufficiently fixed to proceed on to Isabela so we had to change our itinerary a bit and slowly proceeded back to the nearest island of Santa Cruz where a temporary fix would be made for the window until Nemo II returns to dry dock.  A little excitement for us but a big bummer for Claire…the good news is that the boat owner agreed to reimburse her for the cost of the camera so hopefully by now she’s purchased a replacement.  Fortunately there were lots of people on board with really nice cameras and great pictures so Claire was able to burn a CD with pictures from the days her camera was kaput…and all was well in the end.

Galapagos Giant Tortoises

OK, so plans changed a little but I didn’t mind as we ended up seeing a part of the islands not originally scheduled which was very interesting.  On Day 3 we boarded a bus and headed into the highlands where things were greener and lusher…more like what one pictures in a deserted tropical island.  We first headed to Los Gemelas (The Twins) which are two gigantic sinkholes…one is pictured at the top though it was so huge I could only get a portion of it in the picture.  Next we headed to a local farm that doubles as a sanctuary for the local population of giant tortoises.  It used to be that the farmers would shoot the tortoises as they competed with their cattle for vegetation.  Fortunately someone had the foresight to convince the farmers that they could earn as much or more money charging tour groups to tour their farms looking for tortoises as they could raising cattle so now most farmers in the area do both…with no loss of

Me with tortoise at Charles Darwin Station

The only cactus in the world to grow in a tree format

income for the farmers.  After an amazing lunch in a beautiful restaurant situated on a local farm we headed to Puerto Ayora (the largest city in the Galapagos) to tour the Charles Darwin Research Station and interpretive center.  The CDRS is responsible for much of the research and conservation that goes on in the Galapagos and also serves as a breeding location for baby tortoises and other endangered island species.

Cactus growing from lava rock on Floreana

On Day 4 we headed to the small island of Floreana where we kicked things off with a panga (small motorized boat used for ferrying us from the catamaran to the islands) ride and a couple of hours at a lovely white sand beach and the famous Post Office Bay (pictured below).  Post office bay is interesting in that it started as a post office for the whalers and other seafarers hundreds of years ago.  People would leave their letters and other mail for others to pick up as they passed the island.  The post office is still functional with tourists leaving their postcards for others to pick up and deliver for them.  The way it works…you leave the postcards you’re interested in sending while simultaneously looking through the bunch to see if there are any from your hometown that you could deliver by hand.  I found two for Madison so will be delivering those sometime in March…perhaps later than the writer intended but that makes it all the more fun to me. 

Post Office Bay with our tour guide Juan Carlos

In the afternoon we did another snorkel but it was rough water and I didn’t take my camera so no pictures from that. Afterwards we did a late afternoon hike on the island of Floreana where we saw lots of flamingos in a salt water lagoon as well as mating sea turtles and stingrays on a soft, white sand beach.  Various pictures are included…enjoy.

Sea lions…the little one is trying to nurse but is confused.  The big one is a male.

Floreana

Flamingo in saltwater lagoon on Floreana

Sunset through the clouds

Santa Cruz Island

Hola chicos! Well, I’m off the boat and have tons of photos, etc. to get organized from the Galapagos so please bear with me as I try to get updated this week. I spent the past seven nights on the lovely catamaran Nemo II with eleven other passengers: 2 Belgian, 6 English, 1 Dutch, 1 American, 1 Chinese and of course the 7 Ecuadorian crew members. I wasn’t really sure how I was going to enjoy living on a boat for a week but as it turns out…I had a great time and really enjoyed the small ship atmosphere.

Santa Cruz Island, the objects in the sand are remains of a pier from the U.S Military Base from WWII

Sally Lightfoot Crabs

I only got seasick once (when we departed on choppy seas just after eating dinner) so thought that was pretty good…oh, and no sunburn for me despite the fact that we were on the equator…this is excellent news for my WPP (Wrinkle Prevention Program).

My home for 7 nights…Nemo II

Salt Water Lagoon on Santa Cruz…iguana in the forefront and flamingos on the right

Brown Pelican

So, the Galapagos. Maybe a little refresher on the significance of the Galapapagos Islands would be useful here… 

The Galapapagos Islands were first discovered by a European in 1535 though evidence found on the islands suggests that people may have inhabited the islands at some point prior to the arrival of the Europeans. Initially the islands were used by pirates and other seafaring characters as an isolated point of rest between South American and Central America. Whalers and fur-seal hunters later arrived and ultimately decimated the islands’ population of giant tortoises as the tortoises could survive on board the ships without food or water for long periods of time and thus provided a source of fresh protein for the sailors.

Galapagos Penguins 

Cactus growing out of a lava rock

Ecuador annexed the islands in 1832 and as a condition of successful annexation it needed to establish a colony on the islands. Due to the isolation and barren topography of the Galapagos it was a hard sell to get Ecuadorians to want to move there. In the end, the solution was to establish a prison colony…one without an actual prison as the isolation of the islands was considered secure enough and the prisoners began to settle in the Galapagos permanently. Even now many of the residents of the islands are descendents of the original prisoners sent in the early 19th century. Currently only 1.2% of the islands land mass is inhabited and the rest is national park of Ecuador.

View of Pinnacle Rock (and Nemo II) from top of Bartolome

View of sunken crater from top of Bartolome

Ultimately the Galapapagos Islands became most famous for being the basis of Charles Darwins’ ongoingly-controversial-in-religious-circles book on evolution, The Origin of the Species. Darwin arrived on the HMS Beagle in 1835 where he first noticed the variations in species of finches and tortoises between the different islands. This led to his developed theories on evolution including those of natural selection. After Darwin the islands served as a military base for the U.S. during WWII and briefly as a penal colony for Ecuador in the mid-twentieth century. In the end, though, Ecuador chose to establish the Galapapagos Islands as a national park and tourist/conservation/research location in 1959.

Under the sea…

You can barely see them but there are some long, ribbon-like jelly fish creatures all over.  I didn’t think the picture would take but amazingly you can kind of see them.

The first day we became acquainted with our fellow passengers and went on a brief afternoon hike on the island of Santa Cruz where we saw Sally Lightfoot Crabs, flamingos and penguins in a salt water lagoon as well as the amazingly desolate volcanic landscapes which are included in the pictures above (I seem to have acquired a spot on my camera lens so many of these pictures have a little round flaw in one corner…sorry about that…I suspect my camera may not have escaped the horse-back riding adventure unscathed).