Blog Post 12 - still on Galapagos

October 21, 2023

Our last day on Isla Isobela took us to another spot to snorkel and watch wildlife.

There was no beach there but a wooden deck area with steps down to the water. I was sitting on the steps and a big sea lion just came up, climbed the steps right beside me and up onto the deck to hog the best shady area. He was later joined by a mother and her quite large pup who proceeded to drink from his mum. All around were a number of Iquanas just lying around totally ignoring us even though we were less than half a meter from them.

There were turtles and rays out in the water along with an array of small and some not so small colourful fish and the occasional turtle.

Then a family of about 10 sea lions turned up and played in the water whilst swimmers were amongst them. Gaye even got into join them. The young ones especially are just playful like small children.

Next day we were up at 4.30 am to get to the ferry on time to get back to Santa Cruz. This ferry had four 250 hp outboards on the back and covered the 85 km trip on under 2 hours in quite big rolling seas. The skippers are well experienced as they must do the trip a couplpe of times each day.

We got to Santa Cruz by about 9 but our ferry to Isla San Christobal didn’t leave until 3 pm so we filled the day with a bit of reading, coffee drinking and wandering around. I managed to download another book onto my kindle using a coffee shop’s Wi-Fi. The normal wifi through the phone is just dreadful here.

We got to Isla San Christobal at about 5pm, located our apartment and headed out to get some food for dinner. Once again, spuds (very taste) salad and omelettes.

On Thursday, after a lazy start we wondered in the direction of the Charles Darwin info centre and then up the hill to a lookout point. At that point we had the option for a 45 minute walk to an isolated beach for a swim. The track if you could call it that made the worst tramping track in NZ look like a highway. We made it ok even with just sanders on but I had a fall and had to pull about 20 cactus spines out of my upper arm. It seems fine today but still a bit tender.

We caught up with a couple of kiwis we met where we stayed on Isla Isobela last night in the street and joined for dinner. They were a bit younger but had travelled a lot and inspired us to think about where to next.

Isla Isabela is a bit more like Santa Cruz but very clearly most of the economy is geared towards the tourists. Prices for anything touristy are high but we had a nice big local restaurant meal last night for $NZ11.

Yesterday we had a quiet day, an ice cream for me and a coffee for Gaye down in the town before shopping for dinner. Prawns, rice and beans. Then out to Playa de Oro for a swim. The waves were again shared between human and sea lion swimmers. It’s just amazing how the wildlife here just coexists with all the people.

Today we fly to Lima in Peru. We get there about 10.30 pm which will add to the challenge of getting to our apartment. Hopefully it’s quite nice. It in a high rise building on the sixteenth floor I think. We are staying only 800m from the airport so we plan to walk there.

Lima should be a bit cooler than here but have become quite use to the temp here now as long as you don’t try and hurry anywhere.

We have checked out the likely temperature in Patogonia and I think a hot day will be mid teens and cold ones in single figures. We are hoping that we have bought enough warm cloths.