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...........