Santa Cruz Island
Coming back to civilization? After several days without any contact with the rest of the world, we finally arrived to Puerto Ayora, located on Santa Cruz Island. This island has the largest inhabited town in the Archipelago. There are about twelve thousand people living here and their main income is tourism.
Right after breakfast, we went to visit Giant tortoises at the Charles Darwin Station. It was nice to see the big tortoises eating at their enclosures. As we continue our walk on a nice boardwalk, we finally arrive to everybody’s favorites, the baby giant tortoises! Here, we learned about the conservation programs that had been developed in order to save, preserve and repatriate these ancient looking reptiles.
After this visit, we went for some free time in town. The walk itself was marvelous! It gave every one on board the chance to buy some souvenirs or just look around the dozens of shops from the so-called T-shirt capital of Galápagos.
Later in the morning, as the humidity was building up, all of the guests took a bus ride to the highlands of Santa Cruz. It couldn’t have been better! The air temperature was perfect, and the restaurant facilities were very ecological and very much nature-oriented. Pre-lunch activities included some bird watching followed by some swimming at the restaurant pool, and even better, a Jacuzzi treatment just to relax a little bit!
For the afternoon, we took the buses to go even higher into the highlands of Santa Cruz. Here, there are two gigantic formations called “The Pit Craters.” They are located one on each side of the main road and provided us with this magnificent view of the inside of a magma chamber.
Bird watching was mandatory! Some lucky people got a nice close-up of the vermilion flycatcher. Its shiny red color sparkled in the distance as we walked into the giant Daisy Forest, what a lucky day!
After another full day of activities, we came back on board the Polaris for a nice cocktail, dinner and even local entertainment by group of local musicians from Pto. Ayora came on board with some dancers. It was a great night of music and entertainment.
With no doubt at all, it was another great day in the Galápagos islands!
Coming back to civilization? After several days without any contact with the rest of the world, we finally arrived to Puerto Ayora, located on Santa Cruz Island. This island has the largest inhabited town in the Archipelago. There are about twelve thousand people living here and their main income is tourism.
Right after breakfast, we went to visit Giant tortoises at the Charles Darwin Station. It was nice to see the big tortoises eating at their enclosures. As we continue our walk on a nice boardwalk, we finally arrive to everybody’s favorites, the baby giant tortoises! Here, we learned about the conservation programs that had been developed in order to save, preserve and repatriate these ancient looking reptiles.
After this visit, we went for some free time in town. The walk itself was marvelous! It gave every one on board the chance to buy some souvenirs or just look around the dozens of shops from the so-called T-shirt capital of Galápagos.
Later in the morning, as the humidity was building up, all of the guests took a bus ride to the highlands of Santa Cruz. It couldn’t have been better! The air temperature was perfect, and the restaurant facilities were very ecological and very much nature-oriented. Pre-lunch activities included some bird watching followed by some swimming at the restaurant pool, and even better, a Jacuzzi treatment just to relax a little bit!
For the afternoon, we took the buses to go even higher into the highlands of Santa Cruz. Here, there are two gigantic formations called “The Pit Craters.” They are located one on each side of the main road and provided us with this magnificent view of the inside of a magma chamber.
Bird watching was mandatory! Some lucky people got a nice close-up of the vermilion flycatcher. Its shiny red color sparkled in the distance as we walked into the giant Daisy Forest, what a lucky day!
After another full day of activities, we came back on board the Polaris for a nice cocktail, dinner and even local entertainment by group of local musicians from Pto. Ayora came on board with some dancers. It was a great night of music and entertainment.
With no doubt at all, it was another great day in the Galápagos islands!
