Galapagos, Baby...

Now time flew, I can tell you that.

Once more, a whole week passed in an instant and by taking enough time to thoroughly reflect on what I experienced during that week, I am sure I will enjoy it even more and appreciate the whole trip even more.

We started off by arriving on San Cristobal, which is one of the Islands in the west of Galapagos. And since my Mum and I haven’t had a decent conversation during the last couple of months, due to my travelling, we caught up on recent activities and happenings, on both sides of the Atlantic.

The next day we already started full throttle into discovering the islands secrets, beginning with Leon Dormido, also known as Kicker Rock. We met up way too early for my taste, headed to the boat and after a short “preparation dive” at Isla de Lobo, we were on our way to check out Hammerhead sharks and other animals with a shitload of teeth.

All in all during the two dives at Kicker Rock, we not only saw the desired Hammerheads, but also Galapagos Sharks, White Tip Sharks, Black Tip Sharks, massive Turtles and of course Sea Lions.

But the most amazing animal that we encountered that day was a 2,5m – 3m Eagle Ray, who was hovering over us and absolutely ruled the dive site. We even forgot about the curious Galapagos Sharks who we surrounding us and came closing in on us, to check out what or who we were. Somehow I didn’t mind the sharks so much; I was too busy starring at the Eagle Ray in Awe as it flew by majestically. Although in between the two dives, we went snorkeling and a few of the Galapagos Sharks came insanely close, especially after surrounding me for a few minutes, then descending and ascending from directly under me… *Scary Shit*

The next day we went to Santa Cruz in the very early morning, which despite the small size is the main Island. Here I by incident met Nikki, one of the two dutch siblings, that I met in Montanita and Chris as well, and together with my Mum, we shared two midday beers at the harbour before the two of them left for other one of the other islands.

The next day, my Mum and me went to the next dive spot, called Gordon Rock, who as well was habitat to a lot of Hammerhead sharks. Unfortunately we had shit visibility, which is why the first dive only revealed shadows of Sharks passing by about 10m away from us.

During the second dive visibility was better and we even had a female shark pass by us within one arm’s reach. Our Dive Master took heaps of pictures which I will try to attach here a bit later, as Mum took the DVD with her home… :D

The whole dive was a bit over-shadowed by the fact that two other divers who were with us, were absolute noobs and didn’t know shit about diving. I remember them going up and down like Jojos and we constantly had to watch out for them not to bump into us, or dropping down on us from above, tank first…

The following day we again had the unfortunate pleasure of the two doofuses joining us on the third dive trip to an island south of Santa Cruz; Floreana.

It was a two hours drive by boat, which is why we had to leave Santa Cruz around 5:30am, but despite the hassle, the second dive there made more than just up for the troubles of getting there. First, we had a whole school of young Sea Lions play with us and later were surrounded by literally millions of fish who “tornadoed” around us and by their sheer number darkened up the water and made us believe we are cave diving. Again the Dive Master took thousands of pictures, which will be provided later.

The next day we also did a day tour on Santa Cruz to Tortuga Bay, which is like a kindergarten to sharks and rays and every other animal that breeds on the island. It was about an hour to get there, but again we were compensated by the view on a beautiful bay and also saw little sharks and rays; and little sharks are really cute… J

Also, on one of the beaches I ran into Karin from Montanita, who was too enjoying life to the fullest on this amazing group of Islands called Galapagos. Well, rather she recognized me as I was wearing my green hat and the orange glasses…

That night we went to eat all together in a little street on Santa Cruz, which basically is turned into a restaurant as the places all put their chairs and tables on the street and make it impossible for cars to pass.

It was nice to exchange some memories and hear about the experiences, which my Mum especially enjoyed, as travelling today varies severely from travelling back in the day.

The next day we already packed our stuff to Island hop one more time and go to Isabella, the island which Chris identified as the most beautiful of all of them. Upon arriving we were directly put into a bus and drove to see the flamingos in their little pond. Unfortunately those bastards were all gone and only one lonely flamingo hung about there. People took their picture and we returned kinda fast to the hotel to unpack out stuff.

The next day was dedicated to hiking up one of the many volcanos on the island. In the beginning the weather was shit and cloudy, but this made the climb a bit more pleasant, and right on time for reaching the summit the sun came out and burned down on us. And it was a breath-taking view over a 12km (in diameter) volcano that was covered with ashes, volcanic rocks and heaps of green plants, AND still active.

The afternoon was spend snorkeling in a bay just outside of the harbour called “Las Tintoreras” and despite the shitty visibility we saw massive Turtles feeding on sea grass.

Unfortunately, the next das already our day of departure, and after a 2hrs boat drive we were standing at the airport, in line of LAN airline to get our tickets.
I really need to get all those pictures and go through the whole trip one more time to really grasp the (uh, watch out, made-up word) “amazingness” and the diversity of what we saw during the hand full of days.

Anywho, after we touched down in Gauayquil, my Mum and I shared a quick good-bye and thanked each other for having made this awesome trip together and then headed our separate ways: my Mum towards Peru to conquer Machu Picchu, and me towards home, Montanita.

My plan was to change my stuff, and then head to Guayaquil (again) to catch a flight to Quito, because Chris and I had planed to get on a trip through Ecuador together and time was precious… There was adventure waiting for us, and I couldn’t wait for it to get started… :D