This morning we anchored in Academy Bay on Santa Cruz Island. Our activities began with a walk through the “Fausto Llerena” Breeding Center for Galapagos giant tortoises. Here we learned about the restoration project that is run by the Galapagos National Park for the different populations of the Galapagos giant tortoises; the whole center is currently being redesigned. One of the new groups of tortoises we see here are those found on Wolf Volcano, which have dna from the population on Pinta Island, where the famous Lonesome George came from. These hybrid tortoises will be bred in captivity, and their descendants will one day released on Pinta Island. After observing the tortoises in the center, we headed to Puerto Ayora where we spent some time enjoying the town and its little shops.
At the end of the morning, we drove to a small farm which is owned by a local family. They gave us a tour of the farm, showing us how they process coffee and sugar cane. This is the rainy season, when many farms start planting crops like bananas, and rain water is also collected to be used for the next year. After we left the farm, we went up to a local restaurant to have lunch, and from there we departed for a place known as Manzanillo farm, where we looked for wild Galapagos giant tortoise. We were very lucky, because there were many of them all around the property. This is the beginning of their mating season, and many tortoises in this place are on their way to the lower areas of the island, where they will find food and mates. We even spotted a couple of tortoises that were mating in the woods.
We returned to the National Geographic Endeavour at the end of the afternoon, and we had a great time listening to music played by a local band and the dancers from Galapagos.
