Wednesday 26th August 2015 – Morning
Here is the full map of our itinerary. We had reached Puerto Villamil that morning.
Here was the introduction to Day 2 in the paper Galasam agency gave us when we paid for the cruise in Guayaquil.
Here was what was on the board on the boat.
Here is the place where we had brekky every morning, that morning at 7am.
Every morning, the breakfast was just fantastic.
At 7.30am we jumped into the panga and went to one of these small tintorera, small island in the Isabela channel.
We saw THE headless bobby. Unique one in the world. Only found near that small island.
Penguins!!! Yihaaa!!
We were greated by a seal on arrival. Nice. 🙂 A group had landed earlier there and was just finishing their walk. It was amazing how really well organised the boats were so that we never ever walked on the same path as another group at the same time. Sometimes there would be a crossing, or another group would be walking in the opposite direction, but never did we walk side to side. I felt this was just incredible as you could expect to see Galapagos crowded but it is not.
The sea lion.
We walked on this path. Just the landscape itself was fascinating, with all this lava formation covered with guano the poo of of the birds, it created a lunar type of landscape. So weird.
And guess what we are all staring at??
Our first lava lezard. Whoo hoo!! 🙂
And off we kept walking
Iguanas
Hey guys, if you do a selfie, at least face us so we can take the picture for you!!
This is a sea lion poo. White because of all the salt of the sea. Yep. I actually saw a sea lion poo in the sea while snorkling and it is white as soon as it gets out of their butt. Amazing uh?
Lava stone
We continue walking.
Got to this lake, there was some coral on the beach.
Got to this channel next. And guess what we are all looking at this time?
White tip sharks! So cool!
Two iguanas kissing and one saying “hey mate, that`s my girlfriend, don`t you dare kiss her!”
Half-drunk crab
Iguana playing hide and seek but not really well. They always forget about their tail.
When we took the panga again to go back to our boat, it had changed a bit. Oops. Still feasible though, maybe half sleep on the roof, and half on the floor of the boat? 😀
9.30am and the morning had just started only, there was still so much to see! We headed to Isabela island after our walk on the tintorera island.
We disembarked there. Woo lots of people.
Map of the island.
Got into a local bus called a chiva, a wooden bus.
Our first stop was at a lake. And guess what we are all staring at this time??
A lake with a dozen flamingos, so awesome!!
Seen from the side
Two of them, a bit further away from the sleeping group.
We got to the Tortoise centre and learned about the 10 different species inhabiting Isabela island.
Big fat but tortoises we thought. Not much exercise hey? 🙂
Smaller ones
Learned more about manchineel trees, a tree which is poisonous for us.
Saw this bird but not sure about the name.
Saw that lizard.
Other birds, Darwin finches.
Some volunteers were measuring the tortoises.
And weighing them too.
It ensures that they are in good health and growing fine and helps to get more stats about them too.
Who would think little ants can be a danger for the tortoises hey?
List of all the animals which are a nuisance for the tortoises.
Some stats about the tortoises in this centre.
More stats
After that, we went back in the chiva to the pier. The island is really volcanic.
Local sleeping on a bench during siesta time.
Some prefer the floor.
The water there was really pristine and beautiful.
And suddenly we saw…an iguana swimming!
And a seal swimming under him!
Another seal nearby
Iguana`s head
Close-up
And then, a penguin passing by. Right, this is THE true experience you get in the Galapagos, how cool is that!! Nuts!
Such a beautiful colour
Back at the pier. On our right, lots of beer and soda bottles ready to be loaded on a boat.
A big boat!
Off to our panga to go back to the San Jose for lunch after an intensely awesome morning before a crazy awesome afternoon!
Pom explores 