Isabela, the last Galapagos Island we visited

Isabela is the largest of the Galápagos Islands, but the least developed in terms of tourism.  Until recently the island had a population of about 600 locals who were very happy fishing and hunting for a living, a local Guide told us that the inhabitants had voted and repeatedly rejected the idea of opening up to tourism.  All changed about 12 years ago - by 2004 the fishermen had over exploited the stocks of lobster and sea cucumber so the local economy was collapsing, and in 2005 the Sierra Negra Volcano erupted.  Scientists came over via Santa Cruz to investigate and needed somewhere to stay, and then tourists wanted to see the volcano, but they wanted to see more than just a (temporarily) inactive volcano and by 2010 the National Parks Authority opened up a couple of other visitor sights on the island.  The island population is now 2200, and although there are hostels and a couple of hotels, the island remains very unspoilt.

 

A Marine Iguana on the beach at Puerto Villamil, the only port on the island.  We are anchored in the bay, but prohibited from even snorkelling unless accompanied by an official Guide.  They are doing all they can to combine visitors and conservation.

 

The Sea Lions make themselves at home, but their population is kept down here by sharks and whales.

 

The Dual Carriageway from the port to the town of Villamil.  After about half a mile it turns into single carriage way of hard packed sand!

One of the few things you can do without a guide is rent a bicycle and cycle about 5 miles along the coast past some absolutely stunning beaches where you are allowed to swim.  We cycled to the end of the track and then walked to the Wall of Tears, the only remaining evidence of a Penal Colony that existed here between 1946 and 1959.

 

The Wall of Tears.  The prisoners were forced to build the Prison with their bare hands using the very sharp lava rocks and once it was completed they had to build this totally pointless wall, which is 190m long, 9m high and 6m wide.  Many prisoners died during the construction.

 

The footpath continues beyond the Wall of Tears to a lookout point with a stunning view along the coast.  There used to be an American Radar station here during WW II.

 

 

We headed back to town, stopping at the various approved points of interest on the way back.  Nothing really compares to finding a Giant Tortoise wandering along the footpath with you!

 

Our route back to town took us past a Lava Tunnel that extends into the sea.  Part of the roof has collapsed, and you can climb inside this tunnel.

 

Inside the Lava Tunnel - you could hear the sea crashing into the far end, which was a little disconcerting.  There were also a few fish swimming around my feet.

 

Our next stop was a Marine Iguana Conservation site - it seemed to be very successful, there were Iguanas everywhere!

 

In order to see more of the island we decided to go on an organised snorkelling trip to some partially submerged lava tunnels - at $110 per head, it was an expensive trip, but it really did exceed expectations.  It involved a 45 minute high speed boat trip during which we saw several very large manta rays - their wing span was between 4 and 5 metres, they were coming up to the surface and exposing the tips of their wings as well as swimming upside down, showing their white bellies.

 

We arrived at the tunnels, which were expressive in themselves - you could snorkel through them.

 

And there were literally dozens of White Tipped Reef Sharks down there - fortunately they are nocturnal, so were not particularly interested in us.

The final part of our trip was on land, where we were lucky enough to watch Blue Footed Boobies dance - their mating ritual.  One or two eggs are laid directly on the rocks, incubated for 28 to 30 days, and then the chicks are fed by the parents for about 6 months - a strong and trustworthy mate is essential!

 

The dance begins ...

 

She comes over to have a closer look

 

He offers her a twig

 

And he bows - this can continue for a long time, other males come over and strut their stuff - and eventually the female makes her choice of partner.

The next highlight of our trip to Isabela was a hike to the Sierra Negra Volcano - we went with Hugh and Annie from the Yacht Vega.  The trip started in an open sided bus that took us to the start of the trail.  8km later we reached the lip of the caldera, we were told that it was the second largest caldera in the world (after Yellowstone National Park, USA) although even our Guide was a little sceptical ...

 

The Sierra Negra Caldera - Approximately 10km in diameter and filled with black lava it is very dramatic, but we did not find any other evidence to support the local claim about it's size status.  We walked round the rim and on to Volcano Chico through some very wild and inhospitable terrain.

 

A big contrast to the green slopes of the Sierra Negra - the view over the West coast of Isabela from Volcan Chico

 

A few cacti manage to survive here

 

A small lava tube on the way to Volcan Chico

 

After a short rest at the top of the volcano we headed back to the start of the trek, where instead of a ride in an open sided bus we had a lift in the back of a pick up truck!

 

We couldn't resist going for a final dive in the Galapagos, so we went on a trip out to Tortuga Island, a couple of miles off the coast of Isabela.

It was wonderful - more hammerheads than you could count - this one was about 3m long.

Our trip to Galápagos is nearly at an end now, and we have thoroughly enjoyed it.  Contrary to Cruiser's Rumour, a visit does not have to cost a fortune, there are an abundance of expensive trips but there are also plenty of sites that can be visited at minimal cost.  Our Agent, Jonny Romero provided us with an excellent service - including sending 5 officials on a 2 hour ferry trip from Santa Cruz Island to Isabela in order to complete our exit paperwork and stamp our passports.  Although the insistence on being accompanied by a Local Guide can initially seem a  little un-necessary, it does mean that the islands are preserved as much as possible from the impact of humans - you are totally prohibited from touching any wildlife or going anywhere other than approved footpaths ... even on a volcano!

 

Isabela Island - where you can watch hundreds of pelicans and boobies diving for fish, sea lions playing in the surf and drink an excellent Mojito.  This beach is also one of the few where you can swim and surf with out a Local Guide.

Santa Cruz, Galapagos

The second island we have visited in the Galapagos is Santa Cruz, the most densely populated of the islands with 12,000 inhabitants.  Again we took a taxi tour to the highlands and were rewarded with more Giant Tortoise, this time in a very wet habitat where they seemed equally at home.

 

A Giant Tortoise slowly wondering around the woodland 

 

The carapace acting as a built in umbrella

 

But they certainly show no signs of minding the wet.

Our next destination was some Lava Tunnels.  They are formed when the outside of a lava stream cools and sets, the hot lava inside continues to run through the tube that is formed.  

 

Inside a lava tunnel with Hugh and Annie from the Yacht Vega who are also travelling to New Zealand

For much of the tunnel the ceiling was between 5 and 10 metres high, we had been warned it was very low in one place, but hadn't quite expected this!

 

Hugh crawling through the lowest part of the tunnel.  We emerged with considerable amounts of black grit on our hands, knees and elbows.

 

Annie and Ian emerge from the tunnel

There are also places on the island where huge craters have been formed by the collapse of the surface rock due to deeper volcanic action , almost as if giant bubbles of the earth's surface have burst.

 

Los Gemelos pit crater on Santa Cruz

An hour's walk from Santa Cruz took us to Tortuga Bay - a path had been built through the volcanic terrain which gradually changed from scrubby bushes to cacti as we got nearer the beach.

 

Heading for the beach

 

The amazing Cacti Trees

 

As the Cacti mature, the trunks loose their spines and become more like pine trees

 

And finally we get to the beach - miles of white sand, carefully marked Sea Turtle nests and lots and lots of Marine Iguanas

Like most of the creatures on Galapagos, the Marine Iguanas totally ignored us and went about their business - walking across the beach and going for a swim.

 

 

This really is the sea, not a swimming pool.

 

And warming up on the rocks after their swim.

 

Even the crabs here seem more exotic, and they are the only creatures that seem to have any sense of caution - they scuttle for cover as soon as you move anywhere near them

We went for a second Galapagos Scuba Dive when we were on Santa Cruz - again we were not disappointed.

 

We saw several White Tipped Sharks - luckily they were not too interested in us

 

 

The Sea Stars are more exotic than anything we came across in the Caribbean

 

Yellow Tailed Surgeonfish - and even the barnacles on the rocks are five times the size of any others we've ever seen

 

The turtles ignored us to the extent we had to avoid them, but the sea lions again came to have a good look at us, zooming up and then bearing away at the last second.  Again they really seemed to be enjoying the game.

And finally, no trip to Santa Cruz would be complete with out a visit to the Charles Darwin Research Station - there is much information about the ecology of the islands and explanations on the efforts of conservation and restoration, and also another Giant Tortoise Breeding Centre. 

There is also an entire unit devoted to Lonesome George, the last surviving Pinta Tortoise.  He lived for over 100 years and after be was brought to Santa Cruz many attempts were made to find him a mate of different sub species but sadly although eggs were laid, none hatched.  He passed away in 2012 and his remains are kept in a specially air conditioned room where he remains on display as a symbol of  conservation efforts not only in Galapagos but the rest of the world.

 

Lonesome George, the last of his kind

There are plenty more sights on the island worthy of mention, but we plan to move on to Isabella in a couple of days.  Tomorrow we have booked to go on a snorkelling trip to Santa Fe, one of the smaller islands that can only be visited with an official guide, hopefully we will also see more blue footed boobies, sea lions, rays and sharks.

 

As always we have been keeping an eye on the weather.  The photo above shows a recent forecast - the scale at the bottom right shows the key to the wind strength - and we are in a blue bit.  In fact the Doldrums extend much of the way to the Marquesas, our next destination,  so we really need to wait a bit for a weather window as we carry about 500 miles of fuel, not 3,000.  There are worse places to be stuck!

Next stop ... Isabella Island

The Galápagos Islands - Crossing the Equator

A blog on the Galapagos simply can not do it justice ... the islands are amazing, the landscape is incredible and the wildlife is out of this world.  This is just a taster of what the islands have to offer, to do them justice you need to visit yourself.

The Galápagos Islands are an archipelago of 13 main islands (over 10 sq km) and 5 smaller (1 to 10sq m) plus 215 categorised as 'islets'.  Only four of the islands are inhabited (the total population is about 28,000), the area is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and 97% of the land area forms part of the National Park of Ecuador.  There is a Marine Reserve that extends 40Nm around the islands making it one of the largest marine reserves in the world.

Lying approximately 1000 km off the Ecuadorean coast, the islands became infamous as an English Pirate base in the 17 and 18th Centuries but the biggest negative impact on the wildlife was the arrival of the Whalers in the late 18th and early 19th Centuries - not only did they decimate the whale population, but they unfortunately also discovered that giant tortoises were easy to catch and if turned on their backs could live for up to a year without food or water and thus became the perfect source of fresh meat.  Each ship is believed to have loaded as many as 600 tortoises into their holds and during the whaling era approximately 200,000 giant tortoises were removed decimating the population and resulting in their extinction on several islands.

In the early years several attempts were made to colonise the islands, various business ventures attempted, mostly ending in failure, including the use of one island as a penal colony.  It was Charles Darwin's voyage on the Beagle in 1835 that started the Scientific interest in the Archipelago - sadly in those days Scientist claiming species were on the verge of extinction felt it was acceptable to remove any specimens they could catch, this coupled with the introduction of goats, pigs. Rats, dogs, cats and apparently 490 species of insect have further devastated the indiginous flora and fauna.

Despite the negative impact of humans on the islands, visitors do bring much needed income and all activity on the islands is very closely monitored - much of the area can only be visited with a qualified local guide and there is a huge emphasis on restoration.  The cost of permits alone for our yacht is just short of $2,000 - for this we can visit three specified anchorages only, and absolutely no independant yacht travel may be undertaken in these waters.

Our 900 mile journey from Panama to Galapagos took 6 days, instead of flying fish on the deck we found squid, when you removed them they left a black ink outline on the deck, but unfortunately for us the Galapagos sits within the area known as the Doldrums and although we set off in excellent sailing conditions the last two days of our trip were under engine.

 

Crossing the Equator - at 0030 hrs on 22/03/17 our instrument display switched from North to South

 

First sight of the Galapagos and a glassy calm sea

The first island we visited was San Cristobal - 6,000 people live on the island and it would seem they are well outnumbered by the Sea Lions.  

 

 

They are masters of relaxation - we had been warned to take precautions against them climbing on our boat, and many locals put barbed wire around their boats to dissuade them from climbing onboard.  They may be very cute, but they really do smell!

 

Like most of the wildlife on Galapagos, the Sea Lions are totally un afraid of people, visitors are requested to stay 2m away from any wild animals, not as easy as it sounds, they are so curious they come and have a look at us!

 

The Galapagos is the only known habitat for Marine Iguanas - we walked along the coast from the port in San Cristobal and were not disappointed.  The iguanas were all around us, again un afraid of man they can be very hard to spot on the black volcanic rocks where they sunbathe after diving to depths of up to 9m for the sea weed or algae that they eat.

 

 

We did also see them swimming, they use their tails to power through the waves then clamber back up onto the rocks, disregarding the breaking surf, using their very well developed claws to grip the rocks.

 

We took a taxi tour to the highlands, first visiting El Junco Freshwater Lagoon where there were Frigate Birds circling and a great view down to the coast, and then it was on to La Galapaguera Giant Tortoise Breeding Centre.  In the wild, only 1% of eggs survive to breeding age, but by collecting and carefully incubating the eggs not only can the Female:Male ratio be changed, but there is a 60% survival rate.  

 

The tortoises spend their first three years in these pens, after which they are transferred to a more open area that more closely replicates their natural habitat.  At about 5 years old they are released into the wild on the island they came from.

 

This tortoise was one of the many that roam round the breeding centre.  Our Guide told us that he was probably about 70 years old 

The final destination on our taxi tour was the beautiful Puerto Chino Beach.  There had been a huge rainstorm which had caused a flood a couple of days prior to our visit which had washed much of the sand away but it was still a lovely place for a swim and picnic lunch

 

It would be interesting to see if the sand returns to its previous level

The big excitement of Puerto Chino beach was our first sighting of a Blue Footed Boobie.  They are also found in mainland Ecuador, not just the Galapagos but they are very striking and have very cute baby blue feet.

 

A Blue Footed Boobie

As we approached San Cristobal when we first arrived we passed close to Kicker Rock which is considered one of the prime Scuba sites on the island.  We went on a dive and again were not disappointed - there were huge schools of fish swirling round us, a sea lion was hunting them and came flying past within a meter or so of us, others were just interested in us and came over to have a close look.  Although the visibility was not great (not much more than 5 metres) and there was strong and unpredictable current which made things challenging we did see several varieties of shark:  Hammerheads, Galapagos, White Tip and Black Tip which was a new excitement for us.

 

A Hammerhead shark emerging from the glooom

This really is only a taster of what San Cristobal has to offer, but unfortunately for us our visit here coincided with the visit by the Oyster World Rally, approximately 30 additional large yachts were arriving in the anchorage and the place was rapidly filling up.  We decided to get ahead of them and head for Santa Cruz, the second island we are permitted to visit, in order to secure a place in the anchorage there before it becomes over crowded.  

The internet link here is incredibly slow, so all the photos have been reduced to 10% of their original size in order to publish them - this will no doubt be the same throughout Galapagos, so the photos will have to remain fuzzy for now.