Today we had some free time to explore the surrounding area in the morning until we got on a boat to travel over to the Island Isabella. A group of us took a trip back to the Las Grietas area, except instead of swimming this time we went to hike the trails that Tait and the other group did the day before. This hike was very unique in the sense that we were walking through a forest essentially, but it was a cactus tree forest. These cactus trees were very intriguing, and the texture of the trunk was very strange, there is no good way to explain it other than strange. As being in a cactus tree forest you had to be very carful about the thorns, the day before Tait stepped on a thorn that went straight through the sole of his Vibram Five Fingers shoes (I was also wearing these shoes, so I was extra cautious about this as well. Luckily everyone wa fine for the duration of our hike. During the hike we were increasing gradually in elevation until we came to the end of the trail which was a beautiful look out of the surrounding coastline. We took a few minutes to take in the sights and let it resonate before heading back towards the iguana nesting beach which was basically the halfway point between the hotel and las Greitas. When we got back to the nesting beach we noticed how low the tide was compared to the day before, you could now walk far out to a point that if you were standing a day before you would probably be waist deep+ in water. Since it was earlier in the morning we saw many different birds some endemic some that we have seen before such as the pelican. We also saw an abundance of marine iguanas on the lava rock that was now exposed in the water. We spent some time here walking around and investigating the area and the wildlife that inhabit it such as the sea lions the iguana, the birds, some shallow water fishes, and the exposed mangrove forests. Once we spend a sufficient amount of time on our morning expedition we headed back to the hotel to get ready to leave the hotel and go to lunch before our boat ride.
We had lunch at a nice little restaurant on the water right by a marina, as we were walking up to the restaurant I saw a decent amount of shore birds hovering and sitting in the water near a boat and looked in the boat and it was 2 guys that just came in from fishing and were cleaning and cutting up their catch to eventually be consumed in some way shape or form. The fish that they had were Tuna and there were sooooo many of them was amazed, we then sat down for lunch and the lunch for the day was a Tuna steak dish, which I then got very excited for because I saw how fresh the meat was as they were just unloading 10 or so fish worth of meat next door to the restaurant. The appetizer to the tuna steak was yet again soup. Personally, I came to fall in love with the “Aji” or hot sauce it really changed the game when it came to enjoying some of the soups, and most of the dishes. I love hot foods and pretty much anything can be made spicy with the use of hot sauce and be delicious and this was the case the whole trip for me. It was interesting to see the different types of aji provided in different restaurants in different regions of the country. Some sauces were house made some were bottled, some were local brands and for the most part each place we ate had a different kind. Anyway, lunch was fantastic.
We then boarded the boat to head to Isabella. I heard earlier the day before that we were thinking of taking a flight to Isabella instead of the boat ride to cut time, however we would have been flying on the kind of planes that crash all the time, in fact the same kind of plane crashed in Costa Rica the day before was fatal and the passengers were from West Chester, PA. I was so happy when I heard we were taking this boat ride instead. We took one of the taxi boats to our boat which was anchored up in the middle of the bay like the many other boats in the area. The boat was called the dolphin and had a wide open cabin with the back of the boat completely opening, seating was available around the perimeter of the cabin and the back of the boat. I made sure I was sitting in the back in the wide-open area to take in the views and enjoy most of the ride. Our boat was powered by three big engines, so we were moving at a pretty good pace. This also made the ride very loud especially when I was sitting in the back of the boat essentially right next to the engines. But luckily, I had my headphone in my pocket so I jammed out to some good music and enjoyed the three hour ride while pretty much everyone else slept. They missed out. However, I did get a mean case of sunburn on this boat so that was a down side. Anyway, we got to Isabella and boarded our transportation to the hotel. The bus that took us to the hotel was like a truck straight out of Disney’s safari ride, there benches that go all the way across with the sides open and about 6 rows, it was awesome. On the way to the hotel I could already tell that I was going to like this island better than Santa Cruz. Isabella has around 3,000 inhabitants as compared to Santa Cruz’s 16,000. Much less human influence on the environment, not much agricultural farm land that clear our large patches of vegetation, the roads were unpaved it was a true small island town feel. Our hotel was beautiful and within a 2-minute walk to the beach. We settled in and then got ready to embark on our bike tour around the town and to the lagoon where the pink Flamingos come to feed.
This is when we met our local tour guide for the duration of our stay in Isabella, her name was Paula, everyone loved Paula. She was a very likeable person, extremely nice and outgoing and she learned English in 6 months and was able to speak to us fluently with the occasional time that she couldn’t come up with the word for something, but you got to give it to her, English is so difficult, but she handled it like a pro. But I think what people loved about her the most was her passion and love for what she did and the pride that she took in it, it was very inspiring and captivated all of us when she educated us about what was going on on the island. Once we met Paula we all got a bike and of course, safety first, always must wear a helmet! We took a ride down the main strip of the town into an area with very minimal development until we came upon this lagoon in which the flamingos were in. This area we were told was blasted out in mining operations to use the lava rock in a material that built a lot of the houses on the island and then eventually they moved away from it and the area was then flooded with rain and ground water and created conditions suitable for the shrimp to live in which were the man food source for the flamingos in this area. However, they have been seeing decreasing numbers of flamingos because of the limited shrimp source do to the water getting deoxygenated. However, they explained that they will not do anything about this and let nature take its course especially since the flamingos are not even endemic to the island they came all the way from the Caribbean. Also, around the site of the flamingos was the plant that takes in ocean water and desalinates it to be used by the residents of the island. However, Paula told us that the plant has been out of commission and has been sitting there for a bit without any attempts to make repairs. You could definitely tell when I took a shower that nice the water was very very salty. Anyways, we finished discussing flamingos and the water treatment plant and headed back to the bike rental shop and then back to the hotel for the night. It was a great first day in a new island of the Galapagos
We had lunch at a nice little restaurant on the water right by a marina, as we were walking up to the restaurant I saw a decent amount of shore birds hovering and sitting in the water near a boat and looked in the boat and it was 2 guys that just came in from fishing and were cleaning and cutting up their catch to eventually be consumed in some way shape or form. The fish that they had were Tuna and there were sooooo many of them was amazed, we then sat down for lunch and the lunch for the day was a Tuna steak dish, which I then got very excited for because I saw how fresh the meat was as they were just unloading 10 or so fish worth of meat next door to the restaurant. The appetizer to the tuna steak was yet again soup. Personally, I came to fall in love with the “Aji” or hot sauce it really changed the game when it came to enjoying some of the soups, and most of the dishes. I love hot foods and pretty much anything can be made spicy with the use of hot sauce and be delicious and this was the case the whole trip for me. It was interesting to see the different types of aji provided in different restaurants in different regions of the country. Some sauces were house made some were bottled, some were local brands and for the most part each place we ate had a different kind. Anyway, lunch was fantastic.
We then boarded the boat to head to Isabella. I heard earlier the day before that we were thinking of taking a flight to Isabella instead of the boat ride to cut time, however we would have been flying on the kind of planes that crash all the time, in fact the same kind of plane crashed in Costa Rica the day before was fatal and the passengers were from West Chester, PA. I was so happy when I heard we were taking this boat ride instead. We took one of the taxi boats to our boat which was anchored up in the middle of the bay like the many other boats in the area. The boat was called the dolphin and had a wide open cabin with the back of the boat completely opening, seating was available around the perimeter of the cabin and the back of the boat. I made sure I was sitting in the back in the wide-open area to take in the views and enjoy most of the ride. Our boat was powered by three big engines, so we were moving at a pretty good pace. This also made the ride very loud especially when I was sitting in the back of the boat essentially right next to the engines. But luckily, I had my headphone in my pocket so I jammed out to some good music and enjoyed the three hour ride while pretty much everyone else slept. They missed out. However, I did get a mean case of sunburn on this boat so that was a down side. Anyway, we got to Isabella and boarded our transportation to the hotel. The bus that took us to the hotel was like a truck straight out of Disney’s safari ride, there benches that go all the way across with the sides open and about 6 rows, it was awesome. On the way to the hotel I could already tell that I was going to like this island better than Santa Cruz. Isabella has around 3,000 inhabitants as compared to Santa Cruz’s 16,000. Much less human influence on the environment, not much agricultural farm land that clear our large patches of vegetation, the roads were unpaved it was a true small island town feel. Our hotel was beautiful and within a 2-minute walk to the beach. We settled in and then got ready to embark on our bike tour around the town and to the lagoon where the pink Flamingos come to feed.
This is when we met our local tour guide for the duration of our stay in Isabella, her name was Paula, everyone loved Paula. She was a very likeable person, extremely nice and outgoing and she learned English in 6 months and was able to speak to us fluently with the occasional time that she couldn’t come up with the word for something, but you got to give it to her, English is so difficult, but she handled it like a pro. But I think what people loved about her the most was her passion and love for what she did and the pride that she took in it, it was very inspiring and captivated all of us when she educated us about what was going on on the island. Once we met Paula we all got a bike and of course, safety first, always must wear a helmet! We took a ride down the main strip of the town into an area with very minimal development until we came upon this lagoon in which the flamingos were in. This area we were told was blasted out in mining operations to use the lava rock in a material that built a lot of the houses on the island and then eventually they moved away from it and the area was then flooded with rain and ground water and created conditions suitable for the shrimp to live in which were the man food source for the flamingos in this area. However, they have been seeing decreasing numbers of flamingos because of the limited shrimp source do to the water getting deoxygenated. However, they explained that they will not do anything about this and let nature take its course especially since the flamingos are not even endemic to the island they came all the way from the Caribbean. Also, around the site of the flamingos was the plant that takes in ocean water and desalinates it to be used by the residents of the island. However, Paula told us that the plant has been out of commission and has been sitting there for a bit without any attempts to make repairs. You could definitely tell when I took a shower that nice the water was very very salty. Anyways, we finished discussing flamingos and the water treatment plant and headed back to the bike rental shop and then back to the hotel for the night. It was a great first day in a new island of the Galapagos