Santa Cruz Island
Today our guests woke up in the harbor of Puerto Ayora, Santa Cruz Island. It is the location of the Charles Darwin Research Station which was our first visit of the day. We had a beautiful sunny day and every one of our guests was ready to have a walk, the path bordered by beautiful coastal vegetation, mangroves of different types, giant cactus, some tiny birds such as Darwin’s finches, mockingbirds and quick lava lizards. The main objective this morning was to see the magnificent work being done by the Charles Darwin Research Station together with the Galápagos National Park, to raise giant tortoises and land iguanas for later repatriation of the young into their native environment. So successful have they been with land iguanas, that today, April 30, 2008, the land iguana breeding program was finally closed down after 30 years.
Afterwards, we took a bus to Altair restaurant beyond the town of Bellavista where we had a delicious lunch in an open natural environment. As different forms of exercise on the way up, some of our guests got off the bus to walk to the restaurant before lunch and some had a swim in the pool. Once we finished these relaxing moments, we went to “Primicias”, private land located in the town of Santa Rosa. Here, our primary goal was looking for the famous giant tortoises in the wild; the highlands have a healthy population of 4,000 tortoises. These wonderful creatures are protected and free to roam where they will. Female giant tortoises migrate from the highlands to the lower areas in order to lay their eggs in the warm season; they need six months of migration in total, 3 months going down looking for nesting places and then 3 months more coming up. They make this long trip because they have fresh water and a lot of food in the highlands, and live peacefully on that open ground. After a short hike through some muddy spots, we found our first huge one; it was feeding and impressed us all by eating the fresh and sweet fruits of the area. It was a wonderful experience for our guests.
Today our guests woke up in the harbor of Puerto Ayora, Santa Cruz Island. It is the location of the Charles Darwin Research Station which was our first visit of the day. We had a beautiful sunny day and every one of our guests was ready to have a walk, the path bordered by beautiful coastal vegetation, mangroves of different types, giant cactus, some tiny birds such as Darwin’s finches, mockingbirds and quick lava lizards. The main objective this morning was to see the magnificent work being done by the Charles Darwin Research Station together with the Galápagos National Park, to raise giant tortoises and land iguanas for later repatriation of the young into their native environment. So successful have they been with land iguanas, that today, April 30, 2008, the land iguana breeding program was finally closed down after 30 years.
Afterwards, we took a bus to Altair restaurant beyond the town of Bellavista where we had a delicious lunch in an open natural environment. As different forms of exercise on the way up, some of our guests got off the bus to walk to the restaurant before lunch and some had a swim in the pool. Once we finished these relaxing moments, we went to “Primicias”, private land located in the town of Santa Rosa. Here, our primary goal was looking for the famous giant tortoises in the wild; the highlands have a healthy population of 4,000 tortoises. These wonderful creatures are protected and free to roam where they will. Female giant tortoises migrate from the highlands to the lower areas in order to lay their eggs in the warm season; they need six months of migration in total, 3 months going down looking for nesting places and then 3 months more coming up. They make this long trip because they have fresh water and a lot of food in the highlands, and live peacefully on that open ground. After a short hike through some muddy spots, we found our first huge one; it was feeding and impressed us all by eating the fresh and sweet fruits of the area. It was a wonderful experience for our guests.
