Puerto Ayora - Shopping for lunch and Shangri-La 2/28

View from the pool at Shangri-la
This is the view of the surroundings from the top floor of Shangri-La
Girls relaxing at the pool
The shoppers return with the food for lunch. Luis was the other shopper -He took this image

Fisherman was cleaning his catch in town and had quite the audience!

The Police Department was having a race in town that ended right where we were walking - and it was HOT!

Chio is having theur laundry weighed at LAVA FLASH one of the local laundromats in town. The charge was $1 per kilo, and we all dropped off about 2.5 kilos of dirty smelly clothes. In about 3 hours we picked up our laundered, folded and ironed (if requested) clothes for $2.50. To cintrast, the hotel we were staying at charged $1.50 per item regardless of what it was. Quite the bargain, and we were back in business on the clothes front.

At the public market

Thes local ladies were sitting in front of a nice mural at the edge of the market.

Traveling knife sharpener with assistant on his back

Connie at the market

Connie, Luis and Chio buying camerones (shrimp) at the market

We were told late last night that due to a booking duplication we would all have to leave the Angermeyer Waterfront Inn this evening. Teppy has arranged for us to use a private home just up the hill from the hotel for the day and night. It’s called Shangri-la and is owned by some (obviously) wealthy San Diegans. This place is a mansion – 4 bedrooms, 4 baths with a detached casita – guest house. A huge pool with a bar and a barbeque area – a real party house. There is not room enough for all 12 so 3 couples will stay at another hotel in town. The hotel brought everyone's bags up to the house and we can return in the morning for our last breakfast on Santa Cruz. We just have to pack a small bag to take to the Lobo del MAr Hotel in town for the night.

Since we have a complete kitchen at the mansion Luis, Chio, Connie and Harvey volunteered to go into town and buy food for lunch for today and tomorrow. We collected $20 per couple and headed off. Luis suggested we go to a local farmers market where we purchased shrimp, onions, peppers, garlic rice and beans for a lunch. This was pretty cool – lots of colorful people in an open air setting. We got all the stuff back to the house and started cooking. Everyone enjoyed the meal – it was pretty good if I do say so myself. We also bought rolls and lunch meat and cheese to make sandwiches for tomorrow’s boat transfer to San Cristobal tomorrow. Some of the group went to a beach this afternoon while some stayed back to enjoy the mansion. I was among the stay behind as I severely sunburned my right leg yesterday. Bummer! I just must have forgotten to apply the lotion. It’s really red and swollen and I think it better to stay out of the sun. I had to walk around this morning in pants – tough to be in the Galapagos and keep out of the sun. And that’s with another 10 days or so to go. This may be the last update for a while. I don’t know about the next hotel and the 2 nights after that are camping on a beach. Pretty sure no internet there! Will send more as soon as I can. Adios!

Sea Kayak - Santa Cruz 2/27

This is the Playa Alemana (German Beach) at dawn. Later in the day our kayaking excursion ended here

Connie enjoting the sun on our little patio at the Angermeyer Waterfront Inn

William's restaurant in town where we ate a scrumptios local style dinner. That's some of William's family who all help with the operation

Up for another scrumptious breakfast. “Havin’ banana pancakes, wakin’ up slow” (to quote Jack Johnson). The kayak people collected us at the hotel pier and took us over to the main pier area in town (2 minutes away) where our kayaks awaited. Everyone got in and we were off to the races. Facing a pretty stiff chop just in the harbor it was decided (en route) that we would not attempt to go around the second point out in the bay. So, we rounded the first point and were in the really choppy water! Actually it was really fun to bob up and over the waves! We then headed into a straight with water at real low levels. We had to walk the kayaks to a point where the water was deep enough to get back in. We were now in a secluded bay where the paddling was much easier. We saw manta rays and sea turtles and more birds. Next was “The Love Canal” a very clam area with cliffs on both sides. Retracing our route back up that canal we landed on a beach where we went for a short hike. Nice views of the town from up high. The guides had a spread of fruits and snacks waiting for us. There was an opportunity for snorkeling but the water was pretty murky. Those that went out a little further said it was fine. Connie and I gave up pretty early and just sat and waited. Finally, back to the German Beach (Playa Alemana) where most of us landed uneventfully. Poor Luis (our host from Ecuador) took a tumble and lost his shoes, water and snorkel mask and hat. Rich had just found said snorkel mask and it was returned to the sea within a half hour. Must have been meant to stay there – karma. Luis’ wife Chio was on the support boat which ran out of gas or got some water in the carb (not quite sure which) and was “lost” for quite a while. Eventually she returned and we laughed about the experience. Not such a good time for Luis and Chio.
Everyone got pretty smoked from the sun – somewhere on their bodies. We rested in the afternoon and took water taxi to town for a local dinner. Teppy from our hotel suggested a vendor and one of his employees escorted the group of gringos right to the place. The name of the place was William’s and we sat at tables in the street. Actually, it was down a secluded street which had no automobile traffic. We had some delightful encocado – coconut stew with either fish, shrimp or lobster. William’s whole family was helping at the restaurant. They brought us out bowls of beans and some sort of fried banana fritters to try as well. We liked the samples so we got some more. Beers, wine sodas and water were available and consumed. Luis said that this was Ecuadorian soul food – typical of the region called Esmeralda where there is a high concentration of African descendents. Walked around to get a feel for the town and found a laundry that will do some washing for us tomorrow. $1 per kilo (2.5 lbs) laundered and ironed (if needed). The hotel was charging $1.50 per item. We will drop it off in the morning and pick it up after the siesta.

North Seymour Island 2/26

Sea Lion pup checking us out

Land Iguana. This guy was about 4 feet long , much larger than the marine iguanas we had seen on Isabella

This is a male Frigate bird. The male puffs out his bright red neck pouch to attract a mate. They only do this during mating season. I think they look like Dizzy Gillespie blowing a flugelhorn!

We went by bus from Puerto Ayora to the North side of Santa Cruz Island where we boarded a yacht for transport to North Seymour Island. The entire of North Seymour is a Ecuadorian Nature Park - carefully regulated to allow only a set few people to visit each day. Each group of 10 people has a naturalist guide to explain everything that they see on their visit. This was truly an amazing experience. The island is teeming with wildlife. We were able to walk up very close to some of the birds who were totally oblivious of our being so close to them. We saw Blue footed boobies, Frigate birds (both the minor species as well as the Magnificent Frigate). There were other species of birds too many to mention. We also observed land iguanas which were quite colorfull as well as quite large. Once again, they walked up to you or were laying in the shade and they didn't seem to care at all if you got right next to them!

After making a circuit of the permissible walking trails we did some snorkeling which was amazing. They took us some distance from the dock where we landed and we then drifted with the current back to where the boat had gone to await our return. We were in the water for about an hour and the water was crystal clear. We saw some Ecuadorian sharks, barracuda, thousands of tropical fish in large schools. A few manta rays swam by and the guides dove down and grabbed some puffer fish and lobsters to show us.

The highlight of the whole day was the sea lions and seals. This was what I had been waiting for. They swam right up to where we were swimming and spun around us and under us. They seemed either slightly curious or didn't seem to care about our being there. One seal swam right up to me and was looking me in the eye from about 1 foot. Pretty cool I must say. It is impossible to stay anywhere near them when they swim away. They were incredibly agile in the water!

When we returned to the boat were we transported to the North side of Santa Cruz Island where we landed on shore for another nature walk. There was a hot water lagoon where we saw a flock of flamingos. The water was real warm - maybe 100 degrees or so. The flamingos seemed to like it as well as several marine iguanas we saw swimming in the lagoon. It's still strange to see them in the water as I never thought of them being swimmers.

Back to the boat where we returned to our starting point - back on the bus and eventually back to the hotel for another nice dinner.

Bike trip to the Wall Of Tears and adios, Isabella 2/25

Up bright and early after a restful night (our first and only one on Isabella). Feeling refreshed we headed off to the bike rental shop to collect our bicycles for a road trip. Nine of our twelve person crew decided to participate. Isabella was originally a prison island and a small group of citizens arrived to act as guards and support personnel. About 12 kilometers outside what is now Puerto Villamil the prisoners were forced to work at hard labor building a large wall in the middle of nowhere. They broke up lava rock with sledge hammers and then piled up the rocks to form a wall. This is now known as “The Wall of Tears”. This would be our final destination on the bike trip. We headed out of town with a map and instructions to make sure to stop at one particular beach. The bicycles were not the best – gears didn’t shift very well but we were riding on basically flat sandy land for the beginning of the trip. We stopped at a lava tunnel another iguana nesting area and observed several lagoons along the way. All along the left side of the road were some pretty spectacular beaches. Another stop was at a salt water estuary where we watched a fisherman clearing his nets. Not quite sure if this guy was supposed to be fishing in a National park area – not my problem. He was gutting his catch and throwing the stuff to a flock of birds that watched is every move. We were able to observe pelicans, frigate birds, some herons up real close. Also along the way was one of the largest mangrove trees in the world. I should mention that it was HOT. Connie had mentioned that I should have filled up my water bladder but I of course only filled it half way. We eventually arrived at the Wall of Tears but no one wanted to spend much time there. I climbed up a large stone stairway beside the wall to see the view. Not much to see – just a canyon with some scrub brush. There was another nice view of the ocean in the distance but al in all the climb up was unnecessary. People were ready to head back to town and now the fun started. It seems that Rich’s bike broke - the entire pedal mechanism on one side fell off. He had pedaled with one foot and then pushed the ground with the other foot. Not a real efficient method of travel. I volunteered to “ride” his bike back to town and he went on with my bike. Everyone was real keen to have a swim at that real cool beach. I rode back with Luis and we stopped to see that mangrove tree that we had missed on the way out. The pedal would fall off about every 50 feet or so and we’d try to smash it back on…… In the mean time a replacement bike was to be delivered to us. They came with the new bike just before we met up with the rest of the party at the beach. One of the girls’ bikes had a flat tire by this time as well and no replacement for that. We now had 6 people left and 4 functioning bikes. The two girls rode back to town in the truck and we swam for about a half hour at what was to this point the nicest beach I had ever been on. Back to town where we returned the bike – not without more drama. It seems that when they loaded the broken bike into the back of the truck they lost the pedal. They demanded we pay for it and we refused – eventually they were convinced to go look for the pedal. We had a nice lunch at a local restaurant – rice and seafood and then checked out of the hotel and were taken to the pier. The 2.5 hour trip back to Santa Cruz took only 2 hours and we were taken right to the pier of our hotel for the next four nights. The Angermeyer Waterfront Inn is a really nice place – first thing I checked was the internet connection so we’ll be able to post better. Too tired to do anything last night – nice diner and off to bed. More later……

Flamingos in the morning and a Volcano hike 2/24

I got up in the morning today (Tuesday) and walked a short distance to a lagoon where flamingos stay for the night. They fly away each morning (observed) and return each night punctually at 5:00. We'll go back later for their return.

Here's the entire group of 12 at the edge of the Volcan (Volcano) Sierra Negra caldera

Later in the day we were driven from town to the top of Volcan Sierra Negra – the 2nd largest volcanic crater on earth. It turns out that the largest crater in the world is in Tanzania in Africa and 6 of the people in our group have been there as well. You must walk for about 30 – 45 minutes to reach the top of the crater rim. Once there we walked along the rim for about another hour before heading back to the starting point. This volcanic caldera (crater) is 10 miles wide by 16 miles long. It’s quite steep down to the floor of the crater and thus it’s not allowed to hike into the crater. We were also told that the surface is almost all lava and would be quite hard to walk on if you tried. You could occasionally see steam rising from the surface of the crater – an indication of volcanic activity from within the earth. This volcano has erupted several times in recorded history but has never killed anyone due to the size of the caldera. To date, no lava has ever left the area within the caldera walls. Back to the hotel for a afternoon with no planned activities. Connie and I spent some time swimming on the beach which was really nice – no rocks at all! We then watched blue footed boobies dive bombing for fish at a pier right next to our hotel. A nice dinner at the hotel tonight and it’s off to bed. I guess I should mention that it was a quiet dinner because the music has FINALLY stopped. They packed up all the equipment just before we ate at 7:45 this evening. The music actually was tuned down this morning about 8:00 after blasting all last night. The music finally stopped at 6:00 this evening. What a difference this makes - we can hear the surf and talk to each other without shouting. This place really would have been spectacular with out the idioic noise.

Iguanas penguins and boobies, OH MY! 2/23

You are here
You tell me?

The next morning after the Lenten revelry. I don't exactly know what was up with the paint.

Here's the hostel where we were moved to avoid some of the noise. Our room was the last one on the right on the top floor. Although 4 blocks away from The Angermeyer amazingly you could still "feel" the bass notes through earplugs!

Potentially the hardest bed ever slept on in the history of man. But it was relatively quiet!

Here was the cause of the idiocy. The monolith speakes of Isla Isabella - complete with dancing tarts

The Hotel Angermeyer. What it could have been.

Los Tuneles

Marine iguana facing the sun for warmth with some red crabs in the background
Here's a penguin - seems strange to be swimming in the water real close to a penguin without a heavy wet suit.

The infamous blue footed boobie - guess you can see why.

Had a nice day on the water yesterday - finally was able to upload some images. Believe me, I alot more but it's taking a real LOOOOOOOOOONG time for each image to load. We rode by boat to Los Tuneles "The Tunnels" a area of old lava tubes that have collapsed at the oceanside to create a other-worldly scene. We saw quite a few fish and seal lions swimming in this area. You are not alowed to snorkel here as this has been designated a refuge for wildlife. We then snorkled at another place (lots of fish and the occasional sea lion). Ate a box lunch on the boat and a trip to another snorkeling session where we saw blue footed boobies, PENGUINS and lots of fish! Off to Los Tintorenas where we observed sea iguanas digging "nests" in preperation for laying their eggs. There was also a narrow channel where white tipped sharks come to rest. Back to the hotel to more music. Max, (the proprietor set it up so we could sleep at another local hostel and still come back to our room at Elbermeyer to wash in the morning. The rooms had air conditioning and were spartan but basically noise free - at least of the music variety! We gladly accepted the offer and remarkably could still hear the music about 4 blocks away! What a disaster this is for Max! It appears that he in in a power struggle with the mayor of the town (Puerto Villamil) and is being punished with where the festival was located. As I said before - right across the street from this hotel.

GALAPAGOS! Santa Cruz and Isabella Islands 2/22

Got up after what seemed like no sleep at all and had a real nice breakfast at the Hampton Inn Guayaquil. More food than you could handle/want. After some fits and starts we arrived at the airport way too early and then started experiencing the “Ecuadorian” way of doing things. We stood first in one line for our 9:00 flight with TAME Airlines – our flight had been pre-paid. When the TAME representative arrived we found out that we first had to get in another line to have our bags tagged for entry to the Galapagos. We also had to purchase a special card that you must present at various times once in the Galapagos. Rich collected all the passports (12) and collected the $10 fee per person required for the card. He stood in that line for what seemed like an eternity and finally returned card(s) in hand. It seems that the person in charge had to hand enter all the passport information into their computer system. At the end of this process each person has a credit card sized document with their name imprinted on it.
Now back into the original (now much longer) line at the TAME counter where the passport information was again hand entered into their system and boarding passes issued. Once on board the flight left 6 minutes early and arrived exactly on time 90 minutes later. With the time change back to what is effectively Chicago time we were on Baltra Island at 9:30.

Collected our luggage and were met by Elsie (a representative from The Angermeyer Waterfront Inn) who would act as our guide that day on Santa Cruz Island. We will be staying at the Waterfront Inn for four days after we return from Isabella – try to stay with all this it eventually makes sense.
OK, herded onto a bus which took us to a ferry crossing from Baltra to Santa Cruz Island. Our luggage was loaded on to the roof of the boat and we were ferried a very short distance across a channel. You could easily see across this channel which came in handy shortly. Everyone who had been ferried across were grabbing their luggage and getting onto another bus to go wherever their final destination was on Santa Cruz. Unfortunately, our luggage had returned back to the other side of the channel somehow and Elsie’s cell phone had no service. So, now the luggage handler was on one side and we were on the other. They eventually figured it out and we were off to our planned activity for the day.
We had to travel 42 kilometers across Santa Cruz to the town of Puerto Ayora, basically up and over a mountain to the other side of the island. We had planned a stop at a tortoise farm with a lunch at a restaurant. The idea of a tortoise farm seems a bit strange at first blush. The area we had entered was not a part of the Ecuadorian National Park systems but a privately owned farm. And luckily for them a group of tortoises happen to like to live there. It seems that tortoises, unlike turtles never enter the water. So these gigantic creatures spend their entire lives on land and there are ponds and grasses to eat – a pretty good life. We walked around on some paths and saw quite a few of them and then got back to the restaurant for a nice repast. Elsie suggested we stop next at a lava tube which was really huge – much larger than ones we had seen in Hawaii. I guess his lava tube was found when a cow went missing. It has fallen into the lava tube and the farmers eventually realized they had a cool lava tube sitting under their pastures. They even left a pile of bones at the entrance to the tube (perhaps in homage to the cow).
Back on the bus for our final ride to Puerto Ayora where we would board our arranged boat transfer to Isabella Island. We could see the Angermeyer Waterfront Inn off in the distance – looked quite nice. When we return in 3 days from Isabella we will be staying there for 4 days. See, eventually you begin to grasp all of this.
A word about this transfer. We could have taken a “public” boat or arranged for this private transfer. The public boats are not quite so nice or a fast as the one we decided on – spent a little more but basically had the boat as we wished during our trip. The captain stopped along the way for some snorkeling with a group of sea lions. A couple of people decided that wanted to jump in and we all watched the sea lions swim around and under them from the boat. After what seemed like a LONG 2.5 hour ride we arrived on Isaballa.

Our bags were transferred to our hotel – The Elbemeyer – right on the beach in a quaint little town. We rounded the corner to some of the loudest music I had ever heard! It seems that there is a Carnival party going on directly across the street from our hotel. Two gigantic speakers are pointing right at our hotel – about 50 feet away. We were told that the previous night they played music until 3:00 a.m. GREAT! NOT! One couple decided on the spot to move to another hotel a few blocks away. We decided to try and tough it out and the proprietor offered a 50% discount for our stay.
We walked around for a while and found a restaurant where we ate a meal that will seem hilarious after some time has passed. Several of the group had taken motion sickness pills for the boat trip. So those 4 were falling asleep at the table while we waited for quite a long time for the meal to arrive. You could easily hear the music from the Carnival party the 4 blocks or so we were from the hotel. We returned back to the hotel about 11:00 and the real fun began. The power went out – blessedly stopping the music for a short time but leaving you in the dark with no AC! Eventually, the power was restored and unfortunately the music! I do not exaggerate – this was the loudest music I have ever heard. I guess I fell asleep at some point – no idea when – and I had those wax ear plugs jammed in as far as they would go. I tried to post to the blog but the wireless internet connection wouldn’t work. I was sitting in the lobby with a wired Ethernet connection trying to post when the power went out! I was finally able to upload one image - I'll try to add more in the morning.

We've arrived in Guayaquil! 2/21

Well, it took quite an effort but we're in Ecuador! We started the day in a blinding snowstorm and finally got to O'Hare. We waited 25 minutes for the people mover to function and arrived just in time to miss the 6:00a.m. flight. We were assigned to the standby list for the next flight and got on that flight and out of Chicago after a 1 hour weather related delay. When we arrived in Miami we went to the rooftop of the Miami Internatonal Hotel to enjoy some time at the pool. Imagine our surprise when we found that it had been closed 6 years ago:

Rich Rediker had told us to go up to the roof of the hotel to relax and have a drink and some lunch while we waited for the "East Coast Crew" to arrive. We all had quite a laugh when they arrived at 3:00!

Here's the view of the sunset at Miami just before we had ANOTHER 1 hour delay (equipment malfunction on the plane).

We arrived at Guayaquil at about 12:15a.m. and got to the hotel with no problems around 12:45. Time enough for a quick rest and up at 6:00 (later this morning for our flight to the Galapagos. We're glad to be here - it could have been much worse!

Galapagos update

Well, well well.

It seems we have firmed up the last 2.5 days on the Galapagos to include camping on the beach on San Cristobal Island! Rich, our intrepid leader has negotiated an abreviated itinerary with ROW Adventures:

1) One of National Geographic Adventure Magazine’s “Best Outfitters on Earth” Three Years in a Row!
2) "Tours of a Lifetime" National Geographic Traveler 2006-2008.
3) 2008 Top Ten “Trips of the Year” from Outside Magazine.

Here's a link to their Galapagos Adventures page:

http://www.rowadventures.com/Galapagos-Islands-Tours-Galapagos-Adventure-Vacation

This is going to be a blast!

Here's how they describe it:

Day 1 – We will meet you at your hotel at 7 AM and then we will take a trip to El Junco which is a the only fresh water lagoon on the islands. The lagoon is in the center of San Cristobal Island so we will take a bus ride through the farm lands to 700m up to the lagoon which is completely hidden by Miconia vegetation. Galapagos Miconia, also known locally as cacaotillo is endemic to San Cristobal and Santa Cruz and once covered the entire vegetation zone at around 500m altitude. Presently however this plant zone is endangered by grazing, burning and competition by recently introduced plants. We Will hike up to the top of the lagoon where you will be rewarded with incredible views of the plant life, lagoon and Pacific Ocean.

We will then take a 2 hour kayak paddle to Tijeretas where we will have lunch before joining our boat to head to the beautiful beach camp of Puerto Grande. Here you will have the chance to explore and snorkel from the beach.

We will cook dinner on the beach and camp on the beach.

Day 2 - Is a full day of the most amazing snorkeling ever – After breakfast you take your boat to Isla Lobos – Sea Lion Island – and there is a shallow channel where you can snorkel with sea lions – when I did this trip we snorkeled for nearly an hour and I swear I swallowed a gallon of Sea water as laughing with a snorkel is not a good idea – the pups and youngsters will pay endlessly with snorkelers! After this you will take the boat to Kicker Rock – about a 45 min journey and either have lunch and snorkel or vice versa – the snorkeling here is also exceptional and in the channel between the rocks you will see Galapagos sharks, white tipped reef sharks, eagle rays, turtles, hundreds of species of fish and the amazing algae colors on the rock walls – If you are very lucky you will see hammerheads – we have a trip just returned that saw a shiver of them…. There will be a couple of opportunities to snorkel here and get back on the boat – the boat will be just for you so you can determine how long you want to spend in each place. You then take the boat to Cerro Brujo which is another lava outcrop in the water and here you can snorkel again – chance here to see the marine iguanas as well as sea lions and everything else.

We will cook dinner on the beach and camp on the beach.

Day 3- We will have breakfast on the beach and be transported to the airport for our noon flight back to the mainland.

Mama Mia! 8 days and counting...........