jwg

Here starts a series of posts about our trip to the Galapagos last week. We were on the Eric for 7 nights, a 20 passenger boat (there were 19 of us), and cruised around many of the islands. We usually stopped twice a day with a short hike and/or some snorkeling. We had two excellent naturalists, Alexis and Fatima, so we always divided into two groups. They explained lots of stuff while we were out as well as on the boat before and afterwards. I took lots of pictures, none underwater but I have a DVD of Alexis' pictures so I'll be able to include a few of them as well.

We saw lots of sea lions, penguins, cormorants, marine iguanas, and many types of fish including sharks (no-one was eaten or even bitten), land iguanas, frigates, red and blue footed boobies, Nazca boobies, mocking birds, finches, turtles, tortoises (including Lonesome George - the last living specimen of his type) + many other birds.

The boat was nice with good food, and the crew was excellent. There were some swells that made sleeping slightly difficult at times, a couple of people were seasick but we were fine. The weather was good, lots of sunscreen prevented serious sun damage. We used wet suits for snorkeling - the water was warm enough but they make you more buoyant and protect against jelly fish (I saw one).

We've wanted to do this for a long time. The Chilean earthquake delayed our Miami to Guyaquil (EC) flight but had no other effect although the day before we started the boat spent a bit of extra time at sea riding out the potential but non-arriving tsunami. We were supposed to go to Machu Picchu after this trip but the mudslides in late January prevented it, so it'll be back to South America for that in November with a possible trip to Easter Island afterwards.

Although there was no dancing on this trip almost all of the group were dancers, one couple we knew from the Africa trip and one person from local dances. It was a most excellent trip.