Santa Cruz Island
Today we started off with a visit to the world famous Charles Darwin Research Station. Here we saw the amazing giant tortoises and land iguanas. Dozens of babies and adult tortoises of remains subspecies could be seen, just inches from our cameras. This is also home of Lonesome George, the very last giant tortoise subspecies from Pinta Island. After our visit we strolled through Puerto Ayora along cobbled streets and tiled board walks. It is a delightful blend of old traditional shops and restaurant to the more modern internet cafes and artist galleries. Once across the town, we boarded buses and headed for the restaurant Altair located in the cooler highlands. Some of us jumped off the bus early and finished the journey up the gentle hills on mountain bikes or on foot. Coffee and banana farms lined the dirt road with passion fruits and flowers everywhere, attracting Darwin finches, monarchs and sulpher butterflies.
When we reached Altair we indulged in a short rest of swimming and volleyball before a fabulous lunch. Afterwards we were off again in search of giant tortoises in their naturalist habitat; we took a short ride to rancho primicias on the edge of the Galápagos National Park. Here humans have adapted to the animals’ needs where cattle farmers have taken on the role of seeing to the well being of the giant tortoises migratory route. With their help, we spotted at least eight tortoises in the wild. Another short break and we headed off even further in the highlands to the Scalecia forest, lichens, liverworts and ferns grow everywhere here, and we found a rare endemic orchid above our heads on a giant sunflower tree. The end of the trail led us to Los Gemelos. Two huge sink holes of sheer rock separated by what seemed like a bottomless steam vent. Galápagos doves were nesting along the cliff walls, a woodpecker finch was spotted along with smooth-billed anis, and up the stars of the show were two vermillion flycatchers jet black on scarlet red. These birds are truly one of the most beautiful in all the Galápagos.
Today we started off with a visit to the world famous Charles Darwin Research Station. Here we saw the amazing giant tortoises and land iguanas. Dozens of babies and adult tortoises of remains subspecies could be seen, just inches from our cameras. This is also home of Lonesome George, the very last giant tortoise subspecies from Pinta Island. After our visit we strolled through Puerto Ayora along cobbled streets and tiled board walks. It is a delightful blend of old traditional shops and restaurant to the more modern internet cafes and artist galleries. Once across the town, we boarded buses and headed for the restaurant Altair located in the cooler highlands. Some of us jumped off the bus early and finished the journey up the gentle hills on mountain bikes or on foot. Coffee and banana farms lined the dirt road with passion fruits and flowers everywhere, attracting Darwin finches, monarchs and sulpher butterflies.
When we reached Altair we indulged in a short rest of swimming and volleyball before a fabulous lunch. Afterwards we were off again in search of giant tortoises in their naturalist habitat; we took a short ride to rancho primicias on the edge of the Galápagos National Park. Here humans have adapted to the animals’ needs where cattle farmers have taken on the role of seeing to the well being of the giant tortoises migratory route. With their help, we spotted at least eight tortoises in the wild. Another short break and we headed off even further in the highlands to the Scalecia forest, lichens, liverworts and ferns grow everywhere here, and we found a rare endemic orchid above our heads on a giant sunflower tree. The end of the trail led us to Los Gemelos. Two huge sink holes of sheer rock separated by what seemed like a bottomless steam vent. Galápagos doves were nesting along the cliff walls, a woodpecker finch was spotted along with smooth-billed anis, and up the stars of the show were two vermillion flycatchers jet black on scarlet red. These birds are truly one of the most beautiful in all the Galápagos.
