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Galapagos Discoveries

By : Kathleen Rollins
Trip Begins February 24, 2009
Trip Ends March 4, 2009

Hiking and snorkeling San Cristobal, Santa Cruz, and Isabela islands
See my photos : Galapagos Islands photos

Want to go? Hiking Galapagos

I went to: Galapagos, Ecuador, Santa Cruz Island, Isabela, San Cristobal, Highlands, Leon Dormido, Quito
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February 24, 2009
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Flint to Chicago to Miami to Quito

Quito, Ecuador

Adventure Life Trip Journal: Hiking Galapagos Tour
by Kathleen Rollins

The first step in modern travel is often the strangest. It involves packing clothes that don't suit the season you're used to, getting up at 3:00 am, and sitting around airports for a good part of the day. At the Flint. Michigan airport, the man checking in my bag looked at my destination and said, "Where's Guido?" It sounded like an Italian version of "Where's Waldo?"
"Quito is the capital of Ecuador," I said.
"Why would you want to go there?" he asked.
"Because it's wonderful," I answered, and that seemed to be enough for him to decide that it took all kinds.

In Miami, I met my friend from Rhode Island, and we went on together to Quito. The runway at Quito is quite short, mostly because there's a mountain at the end of it, so as soon as we landed, the pilot hit the brakes. No need to tell folks on this flight to leave their seat belts fastened!

Lying just south of the Equator, the city is very high, at 10,000 feet, and it rests against the slopes of Pinchincha, an active volcano. I asked the taxi driver if that was a problem, and he said, "Only when it erupts."

But as charming as the Hotel Eugenia was, with its old style colonial architecture and courteous staff, it was primarily, for us, a place where we could prepare for our trip to the Galapagos Islands the next day.

February 25, 2009
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San Cristobal Island

San Cristobal, Galapagos

Once we arrived in the Galapagos, we met the couple from Colorado who completed our group for the Adventure Life “Hiking the Galapagos 9-day” tour, February 24 – March 4, 2009. Our guide was Sebastian Jurado, an amazingly knowledgeable, capable, and even-tempered man with an easy smile.

When we arrived at our hotel, La Casa Opuntia, on the shore on San Cristobal Island, sea lions were lounging on the beach, on the town pier, and on the decks of several boats in the harbor, sometimes sharing space with brown pelicans. Frigate birds sailed overhead. Because we were visiting during the rainy season, the usually dull brown landscape was transformed into a lush green. There were spectacular tropical flowers blooming. It looked like a poster for Paradise.

But actually, it was better than a poster. The Galapagos Islands’ beauty is not soft or easy or static. It’s dynamic. It’s infused with intensity. This is not a safe, plastic imitation of something amazing. It is something amazing. It was born out of the violence of the volcanoes that rose all the way from the ocean floor. The jagged black rocks that formed from drying rivers of lava are still there today. Once men arrived, they added to the violence, with failed visionaries, pirates, brutal penal colonies, riots, and murder.

But to visit these islands today is to see wonders. An ancient volcanic crater now filled with rainwater. Lava tubes so big you can walk through them. Male Frigate birds displaying their huge red neck pouches. Thousands of red Sally Lightfoot crabs running sideways and jumping from black rock to black rock just above the waves, like a scene from an Alfred Hitchcock movie. The Equatorial sun blazing with such strength it hurts, and the stars so brilliant in the black night sky that the familiar constellations seem showered in extra lights. And, of course, the giant tortoises and blue-footed boobies, the source of endless puns on T-shirts.

February 26, 2009
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Sea lions and The Sleeping Lion

Leon Dormido, Galapagos

On Day 3, we went snorkeling with young sea lions off the Isla des Lobos. Or, I should say, they swam with us. Played with us. We paddled along, and the sea lions swam under and around us, twisting, diving, switching direction, in a bewildering display of aquatic acrobatics. For creatures that seem so – lumpy – on land, they are amazingly agile and graceful in the water. Sebastian had told us the Park forbids touching or bothering any animals, but these young sea lions obviously were having fun with the humans!

Later that same day, we snorkeled at El Leon Dormido (The Sleeping Lion), a rock formation in the sea north of San Cristobal, which is split into two sections. Because ocean swells were creating strong currents in the channel between the two sections, we had to jump off the boat on one side, swim through the channel, and meet the boat on the other side. We wouldn’t have been able to swim back to the original spot. The turbulence also stirred up the silt, so visibility was poor. We saw two reef sharks and two green sea turtles only because they swam very close to us. This too is the Galapagos. You have to take it on its terms. It cannot be scheduled to suit your demands.

February 27, 2009
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Darwin's legacy

Santa Cruz Island, Galapagos

Andreas, our naturalist on Santa Cruz, had given us an overview of the geology and biology of the islands, as well as a review of Charles Darwin’s research there. Often referred to locally as “Charlie,” he is very important to the people who live there. There is a statue of him across from Frigate Hill, a whole series of finches named after him, and a Darwin Research Center that raises young land tortoises for re-introduction. We had a driver named Darwin, and met the two cats at the Windmill Restaurant - named Charles and Darwin. The evidence of Darwin’s theory of adaptation increasing survival rate is everywhere on this isolated natural laboratory. The finches are the most famous because Darwin used them as examples of successful adaptation: their different beak designs reflect the different kinds of food they use. However, the same principle can be seen at work in many other species, from hummingbirds to tortoises. The giant tortoises have been divided into different groups based on the neck opening of their shells. Tortoises that feed on ground plants have a lower opening; those that feed on taller plants have a very high opening.

Of all the tortoises we saw, and there were many, including a pair that was mating (very slowly), I most enjoyed seeing the wild ones. Many farmers who used to see the tortoises as pests now allow them access to their land and make money from tourists who pay to wander their land in search of the animals.

This same tolerance was clear at the fish market we visited. As the fishermen cleaned their catch, a dozen brown pelicans worked their way closer and closer until they were shooed away, and a sea lion stood next to the man cleaning the fish, with his head on the counter, just like a dog.

February 28, 2009
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Sights at sea

Santa Cruz Island, Galapagos

We were pounding across the rough sea between San Cristobal and Santa Cruz, with the four of us seated on the upper deck bench of the “Sofia Girl,” when Captain Naim “Nacho” Zabala shouted and pointed. There, off to our left, was the unmistakable spout of a whale. And the whale didn’t just disappear into the vastness of the sea. It swam toward the boat. As it came up closer, it rolled over on its back, showing its white underbelly clearly under the blue water. Then it rolled over again, swimming straight ahead of us, and leaped out of the water, head first, diving back down, rolling over again, this time on the right side of the boat. Everyone on the boat was standing, pointing, yelling. Of course, we were all standing on one side of the boat, and the captain had to remind us, as the boat listed, that balanced weight would be a better idea.
It was a Bryde’s (pronounced Bree-dahs) Whale, measuring about 40 feet long and weighing around 15 tons, that was playing with the boat and captivating its passengers. It was amazing.

March 1, 2009
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Iguanas, sharks, penguins, and flamingos

Isabela, Galapagos

We took a boat to Isabela Island and visited a marine iguana nesting area that was next to a channel marked “No swimming. Shark resting area.” And, indeed, there were several white-tipped reef sharks in the channel, visible from the trail that ran along it.

The marine iguanas – all four hundred of them – were busy digging nests in what looked like volcanic rubble that baked in the heat. In the middle of the iguanas, a sea lion lay resting.

Later, we snorkeled in the same area, sighting Spotted Eagle rays and Sting rays, sea turtles, hundreds of fish – and penguins. The Galapagos penguin is smaller than its Antarctic relatives, but it’s completely at home in the warm waters. Just to impress us with Galapagos biodiversity (in case we weren’t already), Sebastian later showed us pink flamingos. “How often,” he asked, “do you see penguins and flamingos in the same day?”

March 2, 2009
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Tortuga Beach

Isabela, Galapagos

We took what Sebastian optimistically called a “45-minute walk” to Tortuga Beach. It was very hot, and the sun was brutal, but when we got to the beach, we were struck speechless. It was a vast expanse of white powder sand interrupted only by two marine iguanas that seemed to be having a hard time learning to surf. It was amazing. Farther down the beach, we came to a protected mangrove cove, where we snorkeled with baby sharks. It’s hard to think of this sort of thing as normal, but the amazing had become the expected by that point.

March 3, 2009
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Hiking the volcanic fields

Santa Cruz Island, Galapagos

On our last full day in the islands, we took an 11-mile hike to the most barren and fascinating place I’ve ever seen: the Sierra Negra volcanic fields. The 2005 flow was still black in the volcano basin, and the older flows made tunnels and bridges as if stopped forever in one moment in time.

Some sections were full of loose volcanic rock that tinkled when we walked through it, like piles of beach glass. Different chemicals released during the explosion gave the rocks different colors, so that it had an otherworldly beauty. Once again, it was hard to find words. We talk casually about something being “wonderful,” but when we’re really filled with wonder, no words seem adequate. We sat at the top of the world, perched on tough volcanic rock, and tried to put the image in our minds forever.

March 4, 2009
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Thoughts on these islands

Quito, Ecuador

We need these islands. We need to know there are whales that are happy to play with boats and sea lion pups that are happy to play with visitors. But we also need to respect this place. It’s not ours. We can’t – and shouldn’t – manipulate it. Sebastian said it was interesting that if a person jumped into the water when the Bryde’s Whale was near the boat, it would leave. There is a place for the people, and a place for the whale.

There’s a contract here that we need to recognize. The Galapagos can feed us. They can reassure us that the place we needed to believe existed really does. But, in return, we need to respect it. It’s not an amusement park. It’s a wild place. My greatest hope for the Galapagos is that it will remain a place of wonder and intensity that people will accept on its own terms. It’s not for everyone. But for people looking for a place full of power and life and struggle, it’s a gift.

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