Ecuador

We popped over to Isabela Island for a 3 days in between our time in Santa Cruz.  I actually like Isabela more than Santa Cruz – although the actual land size of the island is the largest in the Galapagos, the population is the smallest of the inhabited islands.  The town we stayed in was really laid back and everything was within a few blocks from the beach.  Our hostel was right on the beach though and the views were great!  The name was Caleta Iguana and there were iguanas everywhere!

The first day we took it easy and just rented bikes to ride along the ocean out to the Wall of Tears, a wall built by prisoners (super sad story, but beautiful views).  We saw some animals along the way.

The next day we went snorkeling!  Jen, Brandon and I all agreed it was the coolest part of the trip.  The boat ride out was really bumpy!

We saw tons of animals while we were snorkeling including fish, sea horses, a giant turtle, penguins, several different kinds of rays and SHARKS!  The sharks liked to hide in caves so our guides had us hold our breath and then they would shove us underwater and into the cave with the sharks.  At first it was really freaky but after the 3rd or 4th time, we got used to it 🙂  The underwater shots are all a bit blurry, but you can still see the animals.

We also went to an area formed by lava tunnels that was home to a lot of blue footed boobies.  It was mating season so the males kept puffing up and dancing around the females.

For our last day on the island, we went hiking to 2 volcanoes.  The first one has one of the largest craters in the world, but unfortunately was pretty foggy.  The second was really interesting as we hiked across lava flows and checked out the different rock from the different eruptions.  We hiked for almost 6 hours and the first and last 30 minutes were through mud several inches thick – good thing we rented giant boots!

We are back on mainland Ecuador after an awesome week in the Galapagos with Jennifer!  With so many experiences and cool animals, I’m breaking our trip into 2 different posts – one for each island we stayed on.

We flew from Guayaquil to Baltra – a tiny island in the Galapagos with just the airport.

To get to Santa Cruz, the most populated island, we had to take a bus and a ferry and then another bus and a taxi to get to our hostel in the largest town, Puerto Ayora.  After checking in, we explored town and went to the Darwin Research Center and saw a ton of huge tortoises!  Besides the giant tortoises, the center was a bit of a let down – we didn’t see too many other cool animals except a land iguana.

The cool part about the Santa Cruz (and Isabela, the other island we stayed on) was just walking down the street and seeing a bunch of iguanas on the dock, pelicans trying to steal fish or sea lions taking a nap.

Most of the meals we ate on Santa Cruz were consumed on what we called “cheap street”.  There was a street a few blocks off the main drag that had typical cheap almuerzos (lunch specials) and at night, the little restaurants pulled tables out into the street and the atmosphere was really fun!

After we got back from spending a few days on Isabela (more on that in a day or two), we explored Santa Cruz a little more.  We visited Las Grietas, a really cool swimming hole in the middle of tall cliffs.  Both Jen and I climbed about half way up and jumped in – the second picture is Jen’s blurry cannonball!

We also visited the most gorgeous beach I have ever seen – Tortuga Bay.  It was a bit of a hike to get to, but breathtaking.  There were tons of cool cactus trees around it and of course, more iguanas.  Brandon and I took a kayak out on the water to try to spot more wild life but only saw fish and a sea lion darting around.