Carolina Larrea

Carolina Larrea Angermeyer was born in Quito, Ecuador's capital city.  When she was 7 years old she went with her mother and brother to Santa Cruz Island, in the Galapagos, to live with her grandparents, Carmen and Fritz Angermeyer.  She studied in local schools (Galo Plaza and Colegio Nacional Galapagos) in Puerto Ayora and finished high school at the German School, in Quito. Impressed by the natural beauty of the islands and wanting to work direct with nature, in 1999 she decided to study Biology at the Catholic University in Quito. In 2003 she worked for the support team of the 11th Reunion of Specialists in Aquatic Mammals of South America and the 5th Congress of the Latin American Specialists Society of Aquatic Mammals (SOLAMAC). 

In 2004, she joined the Charles Darwin Foundation (CDF) as a volunteer student in the marine turtle project.  A year later she started her thesis research in Fernandina and Isabela Islands, studying movements, dispersal and breeding success of the Flightless Cormorant.  As an active member of the CDF, she participated in a number of additional research projects about penguins, mocking birds and flamingos, as a field assistant. In July 2008 she was the scientific advisor for the Rising Lands, South Pacific Series of the BBC, about Galapagos Penguins.  Willing to share her experiences and trying to educate people about the islands and conservation, she became a Naturalist Guide of the Galapagos National Park in December 2008. 

Among other subjects, she has worked as an assistant in hostelling and environmental education for the Smart Voyager Certificate for Angermeyer Cruises, and as hostess in the Angermeyer Point Restaurant, in 2007. Interested in photography since she was very young, she assisted a course of black and white photography at the Alliance Française in Quito in 1998 and now she wants to make a book about Galapagos, its beauty, people and conservation problems.