Santa Cruz
We anchored before dawn in Academy Bay and awoke to find sparkling sunshine and an azure, glassy- calm sea. Dozens of ships - cargo ships, sailing yachts, motor boats and fishing boats - shared the harbor with us, and as we motored to shore in the Zodiacs we could see the houses and buildings of Puerto Ayora built right down to the coast line. Here we have only a six foot tide, and neither hurricanes nor tropical storms in the Equatorial “doldrums,” so it is custom to build close to the sea. Earlier this year many of the buildings that were closest to the ocean were flooded when the tsunami waves from the Japanese disaster traveled all the way across the Pacific and broke on the shores of Galapagos.
This morning the Pacific was just that – peaceful – and we reached the cement dock of the Galapagos National Park after a ten minute ride in our Zodiacs. We followed our Naturalists to the Tortoise Breeding Center where we were delighted to see and photograph cute baby tortoises that moved in jerky motion like wind-up toys. These hatchlings are the result of one of the Darwin Station’s and National Park’s most successful joint programs. Endangered tortoises have been brought from islands where their numbers are greatly reduced and here on Santa Cruz they mate, lay eggs and produce young at a much higher hatching success than they would have in the wild. The young are raised for several years in enclosures where the conditions are similar to what they would experience in the wild, and when they are old enough and strong enough they are repatriated to the island of their origin. Several severely threatened species of tortoises have been brought back from the brink of extinction in this manner.
We walked down through the town following a pleasant winding road that took us past numerous boutiques and souvenir stores. We enjoyed watching pelicans, gulls and even a marine iguana begging for food at the fish market, and we shopped and took photos and then gathered at “The Rock” café for a welcomed glass of cold passion fruit juice. We boarded buses that took us into the highlands, stopped for a sip of sugar cane juice (with or without sugar cane liquor) and climbed down into a lava tunnel at “Rancho El Chato.” We hiked underground for about a quarter of a mile and then climbed out to find that a hearty buffet lunch had been laid out for us to enjoy.
After lunch we drove to a farm lower down on the island, and here we found dozens of giant tortoises. Some were lumbering slowly along in the lush green pastures, some soaked in a muddy pool, others grazed, taking big bites of grass and gulping repeatedly to swallow, and a few of the tortoises just sat there and stared, looking us over intently as we studied and photographed them. They are amazing creatures, these huge, ancient reptiles, and it was thrilling to see them in their native habitat.
The birders among us were pleased to catch a glimpse of a woodpecker finch, and we had good looks at several bright yellow warblers and a shy and elusive dark-billed cuckoo. As the sun began to set in the western sky, the buses took us back down to Puerto Ayora and we either returned to the ship or explored at bit more of the town and the colorful shops.
Back on the National Geographic Islander in the evening, we had a delicious dinner and were thoroughly entertained by a local group of musicians and dancers, “EcoArte,” who came to play for us in our Lounge.
