In a well organised train of events, cars, taxis and boats we travelled out to the airport at Guayaquil as a group, and flew with LATAM (now linked to Delta not QANTAS) to Galapagos for a three day visit. The flight is about an hour and a half almost due west, and lands on the old military airstrip built by the Americans during the second world war, to protect the Panama Canal. The airstrip is on the island of Baltra, one of seven major islands in the group, there being a total of 13 reasonable sized islands. There is then about 150 smaller ones and isolated rocks making up the archipelago. Some say a total of 330 islands and rocks exist.
From the airport, we took a short bus ride to the canal or channel that links to the second largest island, being Santa Cruz, where we took a five minute taxi-boat ride to the main island, then an hour on the bus to the town and port of Puerto Ayora. This place is small but magnificent, being well organised and clean with dozens of small local shops and restaurants, effectively looking after the visitors only. The population of Galapagos is about 64,000 and no one else, including other Ecuadorians are allowed to live here. Their aim is to keep it as natural as possible and extreme lengths are taken to make this happen, such as a fully self supporting eco-airport. Another example is that almost all of the water is made via osmosis, either from the sea or waste.
We stopped at our small and delightful hotel called Acacia, which is about 50 metres from the main shopping strip. Our room was large and had a nice view over the port. The people here were also very helpful through our full stay and made custom breakfasts for us each day.
After a short break, we took a bus to the National Park at Tortuga Bay, where Charles Darwin's "Beagle" first anchored. The walk in is about 2.2km with another 1km to a "quite beach" where we swam, with quite a few other people. The walk is along a fully manufactured stone trail, as this area is full of loose volcanic stones, and used to be a day's walk just to reach the beach The main beach was out of bounds for swimming, but the sea was very stable with small even waves and we were so tempted.
We walked the length of the beach in quite peace, despite a number of other visitors. At the small calm bay beyond, we swam, believing that this was the actual beach at which Darwin came ashore, looking for water and supplies. They were in the Galapagos for just seven weeks. It was here that he developed the theory that formed the basis of his book "The Origin of the Species". This is often reflected as a theory of evolution, but in fact his thesis was that animals that adapt to change (rather than being the fastest, smartest of toughest) will survive.
There are dozens of examples on these islands. We saw many locals including pelicans, frigate birds, marine iguanas and many others. It was simply extraordinary.
Others stayed a while, but we walked back, and then into town a few kilometres. We had a shower and went to a recommended restaurant on the water called Bahia Mah, where I had a first class steak for probably the first time on this trip. We thoroughly enjoyed the day and the exercise.
No comments:
Post a Comment