A different perspective: The Galapagos continued

Sad tortoise at Charles Darwin Station

Happy tortoise

To continue where I left off last time. A taxi collected us from the Charles Darwin station and took us to the lava tunnels that are just outside Puerto Ayora. I will just point out that for most of this, we had no idea what was going on. Our driver spoke some very scattered Spanish and I didn't realise Carmen had organised anything for us.
The lava tunnels are on private land and the wild tortoises like the land, so there are also heaps of tortoises there. It was heaps nicer to see them outside tortoise jail, which is what the research station seemed like. They were much more active and just seemed happier. The only other way to see them in the wild is to hike to the highlands, which takes some hours. The lava tunnel was pretty cool too. What happens is as lava is flowing underground, the outer most lava cools and hardens while the inside keeps flowing, causing a tunnel to be left behind. After we had finished climbing into a turtle shell our taxi driver took us to some sink holes not too far away. Also really cool. He then took us for lunch. It was a set menu lunch, which is a soup followed by rice and fish with plantains (this is pretty standard throughout Ecuador, only with differing meat). We then took the ferry over to San Cristobal where Rodrigo and Carmen met us. Carmen booked the boat tour for us and she invited us to stay at their house. Rodrigo took us to a beach where heaps of sea lions haul out to sleep at night and we saw a tiny baby suckling. Very cool.

The next day we had a dive at kicker rock booked, so Rodrigo took us to the dive shop and then we headed out. I was pretty nervous because it was my first boat dive and I always have trouble equalising my ears. No exception that day. But I did get down to my max depth so far, 18m, and it doesn't feel like my ears were bruised from it. There was only one other person diving with us. A guy from Israel who had done his advanced adventurer course, but he didn't seem much better than us. It was a great dive, we saw so many sea turtles and swam right through a huge school of fish, about 15m wide. We also saw a few white tip sharks again. The second dive was not so great for me. The others just went woomp down and I was stuck at 12m with ear pain. The dive master had told me it helps to descend with your body horizontal. Which it did a bit. At one stage I completely lost sight of the others but for their bubbles. I can tell you, it took a lot to keep calm then. Eventually my ears got the memo, and I got down to the others and it was smooth sailing from there. The currents were pretty fun, at one point as you turned a corner you just went flying. In another area the current would stop you from moving completely, and then shoot you forward. I did my first safety stop on the first dive, and nailed it. Both the boys were all over the place.
In the afternoon, Rodrigo took us to the Centre of Interpretation. Which is just information about the colonisation of the islands. Basically everyone had a go and lots of people died, and lots of tortoises got eaten. Tortoises can live for a month without food or water, so they're the perfect sea snack. We then went to another beach to watch yet more sea lions haul out for the night.

So many sea lions!

The next morning Rodrigo took us to La Laguna, the only fresh water in all the Galapagos Islands. It is an old volcano crater that has filled with rain water. Walking around it was magical. The fog rolled across the water as some frigate birds arrived to wash salt off their feathers. On the way back we stopped at a very un-OH&S tree house. I can't really explain it well without pictures but it was cool.
After lunch we took the ferry back to Santa Cruz. It was an awful crossing. Much like being put in a bottle and shaken for 2hrs.

Frigate birds flying over La Laguna

Tree house

On Sunday we had a relax day. We met Janine and walked to Tortuga Bay and had a picnic on the beach, fending off finches. In the afternoon we had a little bible study and gospel meeting with Janine and Ookyoung. I did get rather burnt because I didn't think of sunscreen at all and we were out in the midday sun.

Today we did a day trip to Isabela, the largest Island. It was good-ish. We had a little boat ride around the dock to look at blue-footed boobies, penguins and sea lions and then went on shore to see baby marine iguanas and white tip sharks sleeping in a channel. It was good because we saw a lot of iguanas and we hadn't seen that many before, but it was a tad boring. We went snorkeling with the worst masks ever. The tube filled with water every 5 minutes and the mask every 2 minutes, causing me to nearly panic at times. I would think it was similar to having a collapsed lung. Fins were not provided, pretty dodgey for $120 per person. We did see a heap of turtles and got to swim with iguanas. We had lunch (el cheapo set lunch, included in the tour) and saw a few flamingos before going to the tortoise breeding Centre there. Exactly the same as the other one. Then a 2hour ferry ride back again.
Our trip today made us very glad we did our cruise. There were 3 Americans just doing day trips like that for their whole stay. I would get over that pretty quick. I think a self guided trip would be fine but you would have to stay on each inhabited island for a few nights and organize activities from there, rather than basing yourself on one Island. We did some basic sums and we think, considering the extra time you need to do that, you would end up spending similar to a 4 day cruise anyway.

We fly back to Quito tomorrow so we had dinner in a street that fills with tables and chairs come 7pm. I came across the rudest Australian traveler ever. When we sat down there was no one around, but later a group decided to sit right behind us. One middle-aged lady decided that instead of politely asking me to move my chair a little, she would slam her chair into mine about 8 times and then loudly proclaim she couldn't get in. I just calmly sat there eating my food while pretending I could neither feel the bashing, nor hear her nasal cries. Meanwhile, a storm of fury raged inside me. Common courtesy is often forgotten it seems.

Until next time!