Day 1
George:
"Are you carrying any mud or soil?" Check box - no.
"Seeds or other plant matter?"
Check box - no.
"Animals?" I look suspiciously at Ellen.
Check box - probably not.
The form we have to fill out before boarding our flight to the Galápagos is a scroll of inquisition. As luck has it however we were both pre-warned. Last night in the hotel, shoes were scrubbed free of mud (airport security will stop you boarding if they are any less than spotless), wooden souvenirs and volcanic rocks were put into storage and backpacks were searched for any stray seeds or grass. The Ecuadorean officials take the preservation of the Galápagos very seriously, it is an added bonus that our bags feel that much lighter as a result. Our flight from Quito to Baltra; the larger of two international airports on the Galápagos, turns out in reality to be two flights with a stop in the coastal city of Guayaquil to pick up more passengers. Ellen chalks up another flight as evidence of a fear very well overcome and after a layover of an hour (where we don't have to get off the plane) we are finally off to one of the most anticipated locations on our trip.
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We land in heavy winds with the plane buffeted as we pass over flat islands of rocky desert. From above our first sight of the Galápagos is one of emptiness and windswept wilderness, apart from a dirt road cutting a straight line right across the center of one island we see no evidence of human habitation at all. Even the island we land on doesn't have much on it. In fact, and to be precise, the entire contents consist of:-
- 1 medium sized military complex, US naval, now used as the airport
- 3 wind turbines, newly installed
- 2 buses
- a land iguana
- several hundred somewhat stunted trees, species unknown
- more cacti than trees, just
- a few more land iguanas
- 1 ferry terminal
We navigate all of them in roughly that order with our first encounter with the local wildlife coming courtesy of our bus having to perform an emergency stop straight away on the road outside the single airport building. We all try to snap pictures as the bus driver then carefully drives around the iguana sunbathing on the tarmac.
The journey from this point to our accommodation for our first night on Floreana island 100Km to the south takes another 5 hours, two buses, 3 boats and a modified milk float, all in glorious sunshine and English summer temperatures. We see dancing crabs, sea lions lounging on the rocky shorelines, frigate birds plucking fish from the water, brown pelicans gliding overhead, finches, fish, iguanas and, most memorably of all, dolphins breaking from the wake of our speed boat in the open water as the sun sets into the horizon behind us.
Most journeys from airport to hotel, anywhere in the world, take you on a dark and dingy taxi ride through industrial centers and city outskirts. This is not the case on the Galápagos.
Day 2
Ellen:
It is only a short walk from our 'home-stay' to the bay which will host our first Galápagos snorkeling experience. The home-stay is actually a large hotel sized bedroom, four paces across a courtyard from the family owned cafe where we ate dinner. It's a hotel. G adventures only feel the need to call it a home-stay because the tour we are on is meant to be 'YOLO' (you only live once) - or 'budget', to those of us who use the English language properly. Every other place we will be staying we will be camping in tents. it's just that the campsite on Floreana isn't ready yet. But before we can begin the walk, we must participate in the wetsuit/no wetsuit debate. We are on the equator here, but the weather is unpredictable. They are known as the 'disappearing isles' due to the sea mists which roll over them at a moment's notice, hiding and revealing them magically to sailors passing by, casting-over the otherwise azure skies for a few hours or whole days. It can be fairly chilly. Also, the Pacific Ocean in which the islands sit is as big as half the planet and long to warm, even in Equatorial regions. These waters in particular, which bring such abundance of marine wildlife to it's shores, flow directly from the Antarctic. The water is therefore fairly bracing, especially for those of our group from places such as Australia, which seems to me to have sea water as warm and clear as the hot tub in my friend's garden. Not much like the cold, brownish waters of Sandwich bay. And therefore, the group is divided. Wet suits are $10 to rent and we are all on backpacker budgets. In the end, all apart from George, myself and a lovely Belgian girl called Karen decide to get them. We are determined that, as Brits, we can cope with, if not thoroughly enjoy the cold water. Despite the overcast weather. And the spits of rain. ...
I'm going to be honest with you. I wanted to get a wet suit. But once George said he wasn't, it was a matter of pride. So we set off on our hike around the coast of Floreana Island. Almost immediately we were climbing over small piles of the volcanic rock of which all the islands are made. We quickly spotted fast sprinting lava lizards, with their recognisable red necks (the females) and were shown marine iguanas' nests - marked by small rings of rocks to stop people stepping in them. Small ground finches fluttered from sandy floor to the branches of the trees which smell deeply and sweetly of fennel. The finches are an example of one of the sizeable variety of Darwin finches which populate these islands. So named due to the fact that despite their common ancestor, they have evolved vastly different shaped and sized beaks, depending on the type of food most available in the area they evolved in. When Darwin visited these islands, these birds helped prove his theory of evolution, so they were named collectively after him. Individually, however, they are not particularly inventively named. There is the small ground finch and the medium ground finch, and indeed the large ground finch all of which live on the ground. There is the small tree finch, medium tree finch and large tree finch, the cactus finch and three species of wood finch (small, medium and large) among many others. But their natural history is fascinating enough to counteract a dull name by a long way.
George and I have lagged behind taking photos, but as we hasten our step to catch up with the group, we pass out of a patch of scrubby bushes and are met by the sight of a tiny, bright blue bay. Encircled by black volcanic rock-pools and strips of white sand, it is secluded and beautifully calm-watered. As we stand there grinning at each other, the sun chooses that moment to break hotly through the mist and glint off the now invitingly cool waters. The whole group stands and looks on in excited pleasure, as our guide, Alex points out the far bank and the sea lions living there. (Please imagine the following in the best Ecuadorean accent you can put together - a cross between Spanish and Mexican) "Do not swim out to to the far bank. Perhaps, you are wondering 'why?'. It is because a large male is nesting there. If you swim up to him he may BITE you. Or, try to mate with you. But, I don't know, perhaps that is the reason you have come here. If that is your kind of thing, don't let me stop you!". We already love Alex like an eccentric uncle. Full of knowledge and love for his country, he has the smiley, patient expression of a three-toed sloth. Slightly round of belly and duck-footed, his walk is easily identified if we loose him ahead of us in a crowd. He is charming, witty, incredibly talkative and forever calm. He punctuates all of his explanations with "probably, you are wondering..." and his favourite catchphrase is "No rush, don't hurry, take your time. But we have to go/dinner is ready and is getting cold/the bus is leaving". By day two we have all adopted it and are finishing the phrase for him.
Back to the bay and George and I are straggling again, this time with Katrine, from Denmark. We are strolling and chatting when suddenly she points out at the water and says "What's that?". We turn and look to where she is pointing and can just make out a small oval shape about the size of a mango, greenish and mottled in colour as far as we can tell, bobbing on the surface of the water. It dips below the surface and re-appears a few meters along. Almost simultaneously the three of us realise what we are looking at. "Sea turtle!" One of us cries out, attracting the attention of the group further along the coast, and we all point excitedly out at the waves. And then we notice one, two, four or five more heads appearing and disappearing, all swimming in the direction of the bay in which we are about to snorkel. We hurry around the curve of the beach to rejoin the group and by this point the turtles have come level with them and are close enough that we can now look down through the clear Pacific water and see their full shapes. They are green sea turtles, Alex tells us. They are stunning and take our breath away. I know we chose to visit these islands specifically because of the abundance of wildlife, but to be presented with so many of some of the most iconic and endangered creatures in the world on our first full day there was somewhat overwhelming.
It's now a race around to the small strip of sand where we can leave our belongings and get into the water. As I throw off my T-shirt and shove my feet into flippers, the sun beats down hard on my shoulders. I am into the water second (after Amy the Australian marine biologist - I have never seen anyone get into a skin tight rubber suit that quickly) and incredibly grateful for my lack of wetsuit, which allows me to get straight out into the - admittedly cold, but sea-turtle-filled water. It is barely thirty seconds before I've found one, moving serenely from rock to rock with slow, elegant beats of it's flippers. It takes purposeful snapping mouthfuls of seaweed from the black rocks on the sea floor as I float above it and remind myself to breathe through the excitement. By this point Alex is in the water along with almost everyone else and he beckons us over to another turtle. George is still in the shallows trying to sort out his snorkelling gear. I call out to him and he tells me not to worry and carry on, he will join in a moment. I don't need to be told twice and a swim as fast as I can to see another turtle. And another and another. Great big, old, magnificent creatures, paying us no mind at all as we tutor ourselves to stay the required 1.8 meters away from each animal.
George:
Flippers are not natural things to walk in and it probably would have made far more sense to put them on when I was already in the water. The same is almost certainly true for my snorkeling mask which is succeeding only in forcing all of my hair to go either in my eyes or up my nose. The reality is that my own short walk over slippy lava takes a while longer than Ellen's as I slip, and stub, and huff and then go blind as the mask fogs up completely. I hear Ellen shouting something about turtles in the distance and wave a currently free hand in the direction of her voice before slipping again, but this time into water. It is only ankle deep, and as cold as the North Sea in summer, but a start's a start. I can only imagine as I shuffle backwards an inch at a time (it's easier to walk backwards in the flippers), flicking up sand with every step, mask fogged, hair trapped and breathing heavily through my mouth piece that I look every inch the snorkeling expert. It is with heady confidence therefore that I finally shuffle backwards past a couple of others in our group into deeper water and flail myself into a floating position.
The world goes quiet the moment your head is underwater. I can hear my own breathing, still unnaturally heavy but getting more regular as I get used to the reduced amount of air coming in through the snorkel. I can hear the soft splashing from others in the group and the water as it bubbles up through my mustache and straight into my mask. That last one is not an ideal sound and is somewhat ruining the tranquility of the moment so I resolve to fix it.
A bit more flailing later and I am perched on flipper toe on an outcrop of lava, head just above the water and balanced somewhat precariously. I have readjusted my mask so that it now only lets in water slowly (the best achievable without copious amounts of Vaseline) and given it a wash with spit and sea water. Ten minutes after Ellen I feel just about ready to actually look at what's underneath me without drowning, so with a steady breath I take the plunge again.
Sea turtle! A sea turtle was what was almost directly underneath me. It's so close that I could have stood on its back instead of my rock. I can see the individual markings on its shell and the scales of its flippers. I let myself float spread-eagled over the top of it trying not to move, but it shows absolutely no mind to my presence and continues to graze on the sea grass growing in between the boulders. There are few words to describe the feeling of being that close to a wild and truly iconic animal. It makes everything else just wait a minute, you stop still and hold your breath almost without thinking, you have this silly smile that you can't wipe off your face and you stop paying attention to everything else in your surroundings as you focus on all the little details you want to remember. As a result both sea-lions flanked me at about the same time and I jumped out of my skin. And in my defense they are a very large animal to have sneak up on you, especially when one of them might want to mate with you. Compared to the sedate pace of the turtle the sea-lions flow like the water they move through. They turn and spiral underneath me, circle my flippers and then straighten and are gone before I can move from my spread-eagled position on the surface. With a mixture of adrenaline and astonishment I think that this must be one of the most amazing experiences anyone is ever likely to have and cannot help myself from laughing, which it turns out is not a great thing to do while snorkeling.
Ellen:
I have been playing with sea-lions. They slid off their rocks and joined us in the water almost as soon as we entered it and Alex's previous warnings about the possibility of sea-lion sexual assault or battery had us all paddling backwards in minor panic. "They are females!" I hear Alex calls to us in one of the brief moments that the water laps below the level of my ears. I lift my head and scull in the water to hear him better. I'm met by the sight of 13 equally concerned looking faces (as much as you can tell the expression of someone wearing snorkeling gear) and, a way off from the group, George lying motionless, spread out in the water like a starfish. I assumed he was looking at something and not drowned. Alex calls to us again ; "They will not hurt you unless you hurt them!". Ok then. Sure. So I dip my head back under. One sea lion is doing donuts underneath me. As soon as I am outstretched in the surface it whips round and swims parallel to me, tilting it's smooth, big eyed head back to watch me. It seems to challenge me with a look directly in the eye and a raspberry of bubbles from it's whiskered nose. So I swim along next to it (still keeping the required distance away of course). And although I cannot match the speed and agility of it's smooth, streamlined body, I am just about able to show it as much attention as it apparently has in me. Another one cuts across between us and spirals away. This is incredible, I'm living in a fantasy world.
Finally I pull my head up too see if George is OK and find him treading water not too far off, trying to sort his mask out. I kick my way over to him. Whilst attempting to simultaneously wipe salt water out of his eyes, blow it out of his nose, wipe hair from his brow, rinse out his mask and keep his head above water, he manages to breathlessly and excitedly tell me "I was watching a sea turtle! And then two SEA-LIONS swam under me! There are sea lions in the water!". I try to look surprised and I agree with him that it's incredible, whilst attempting to hide the four or so I have wit-bonded with behind my back.
The sea lions seem to love having us in the water and more and more of them join to weave between us like excited springer spaniels and our time in the water goes past in a whirlwind of thrilling chases with them, moments of stillness as I come across another majestic turtle or my attention being grabbed here there and everywhere by brightly coloured parrot fish. The parrot fish are what's to thank for the white sand beaches. All the Galápagos Islands are are volcanoes and the rock created by their eruptions. So the ground is simply black volcanic boulders with varying degrees of vegetation on top. The sand, however is the poop of the hard-beaked coral-eating parrot fish. Coral is white, so there you go, nice soft white poop sand.
Time goes by too quickly and before we know it we are being beckoned back to shore by Alex. Reluctant to leave, I bask rib-deep in the shallows as he tells us that that morning was the most busy he has ever seen the bay. "Normally we are lucky to see one, maybe two turtles! And the sea lions are hardly ever here! You are so lucky!" And my goodness do we feel it. However, though I wish I could float about in this spot forever, the coolness of the water becomes suddenly far more apparent when you're not kicking or moving yourself around, so we clamber out and, dented foreheads and duck-lips all around, we chat excitedly together about what we saw and head back to base.
Lunch, and in fact all meal times from day one were a happy, social, nattering affair on this trip. The exciting, surprising nature of everything we were seeing and doing meant we were almost instantly comfortable around each other. Lunch was spent discussing the pros and cons of soup as a starter for every meal of the day. Morten, boyfriend of Katrine and fellow Dane, was firmly on the pro side. But then again he seemed to be on the pro side of food in general (not that you could tell to look at him, but that guy has an appetite to rival even mine!). George, however, was on the brink of drowning himself in vegetable broth. We were joined at our meal by 20 or so small ground finches. Hopping about on cartoon stick-like legs, they are undeniably sweet. It's quite hard to tell what counts as a small ground finch and what counts as a medium, as you only ever seem to see them in groups of their own kind, so the name seems a matter of context. We had to remind them frequently that we are not allowed to feed the wildlife, but they seemed to think it didn't count if they fed themselves. Off our plates. While we were still eating. One of the most wonderful things about these islands, and something they are doing their best to maintain, is that humans are such a comparatively recent addition to the inhabitants that the animals here have not adapted or evolved to fear us. This means that on the whole, they are pretty unphased by our presence, and that's the reason there are strict rules about touching and feeding. Not because they might bite or we might distress or scare them, but because it's too easy and therefore tempting. The last thing the Galápagos wants is the animals becoming reliant on humans or so trusting that they get hurt. At least one species of giant tortoise was hunted and eaten to extinction. Not that there's much a giant tortoise can do to avoid humans even if it wants to, besides sitting next to some boulders and trying to look inconspicuous. But the principle still stands.
George:
"She was a crazy woman. She had multiple lovers and she would lead them about on a chain." Alex's telling of history keeps in all the interesting bits, even when he is haphazardly working his way through all the previous inhabitants of the island. "She called herself a baroness and then an empress of Floreana island, even though there were only two other families living here at the time and neither of them listened to her or even liked her!" His job is made easier by the fact that the previous inhabitants of Floreana all seem to have been eccentric, totally crazy, shipwrecked mariners or pirates. Some of the earliest settlers were the Wittmer family from Germany. It is a testament to the islands beauty, or to their stubborn eccentricity that their descendants still live here. They run the only recognised hotel on the island and boast such luxuries as a working telephone. It is still the only one on Floreana.
We have just been hauled by milk float - Perhaps I should explain - it isn't really a milk float, it's an open air motorised van with church pews for seats, a cab like you might find on an articulated lorry and large sheets of plastic nailed in strategic places as windshields. Nothing like a milk float in fact but it made me think of one from its appearance at first so that's what I called it. -
We have just been hauled by milk float up into the highlands. As soon as we left the coast behind and the wind dropped away we could feel the prickling of the equator on our skin. The vegetation on the island feels harsh and hardy. Exactly what you would expect to find on an Equatorial island made of lava, or almost exactly except that everything here is green. It might only be the green of a cactus stem, or of tiny delicate leaves on a Stranglethorn bush but green it is and that is the overriding impression you get as you drive out of the village and up into the hills. And that impression only gets stronger as the float climbs higher. None of the islands get particularly high above sea level and the highest point on this one is barely half a kilometre up at 640m, but it is enough for the mists to roll in a little and provide some protection from the sun. It allows lush forest to grow in the upper reaches, and as the road just suddenly stops we have to stop too. The forest has taken over from the gravel and pumice, from here I guess we will have to walk.
When we climb down from our pews we find ourselves at the edge of a national reserve. The whole of the Galápagos is a reserve in truth, but even within that there are areas which are marked out for special significance. Ahead of us there is a thin dirt track marked out by lava rocks (technical geology term) on either side and, most excitingly, a sign. The sign with the image of a tortoise on it.
"Probably you are wondering, who were the first people on the island?" Alex is dispensing with chronology and pointedly ignoring the tortoise sign for now as he continues his history lesson. "They were whalers. It is one of the only safe harbours for thousands of kilometres, because we are in the Pacific Ocean, and they stopped here to repair their boats and exchange messages with other vessels. But they did not come up here to the high land." His delivery is slow, words pulled out on their own with emphasis. "So probably you are wondering, who came to the high land first?" He looks around to check that we are wondering, and having convinced himself that we are he carries on. "It was a pirate. Do you know his name?" The group all look at each other. "Sir..." he proffers, "Francis..." well that somewhat gives it away "Drake." He smiles at us all warmly. "The pirates used caves in the mountain to store and smuggle goods, and also like the whalers they used Floreana as safe haven for their boats. Some of the caves they dug still exist and that is what we are going to see now."
"After we see the tortoises."
We all keep up as Alex waddles away with a small smile hiding on his face. If there is one animal that the Galápagos is known for, unquestionably it must be the giant tortoise. There are as many species here as there are islands for them to live on, each has its own unique adaptations and character and thanks to lonesome George they have become famous worldwide as a symbol of wildlife conservation and the impact that humans can have. Ellen and I search the forest as we walk. It has a strange character, not tropical and yet not temperate either. The trees are a mix of endemic and introduced species, there are palms and ferns, guava trees and blackberry bushes, laurel and poisonous manzanillo trees. Alex points each new species out to us as we walk, cautioning us not to eat the highly alkaline fruits that look like apples and handing out guava instead. The walking is easy on the legs, a gentle upwards gradient leads us quickly away from the road on a trail that is clearly well used by the locals. It is not long before we reach a low stone wall that cuts across the trail. Perhaps wall is being generous it was more a pile of rocks placed carefully in a line, an obstacle difficult for a tortoise but not for us as we step straight over and carry on. The giant tortoises on Floreana are not native to the island but brought here from Isabella after the native population were wiped out. In this particular case they were brought not as a conservation initiative but as pets, hence the crude enclosure. Initially the tortoises were cared for but not allowed to breed as they were technically an invasive species, but somewhere along the line people stopped paying attention and now there are whole generations of tortoises here that live wild.
It doesn't take long for us to spot one. They are huge, the size of a 1.2m by 0.7m by 1m box (Similes fail me) and lying passively by the side of the path, utterly unconcerned. The tortoise lifts a lazy head to observe us out of one eye before deciding to go back to sleep. It's skin looks old and weathered, full of wrinkles and dusky green grey. And so it should do, it's almost 100 years old.
"There are more over there." Says Alex and we turn to see another two in the forest behind us. These are more active, though not by much, heads swinging slowly ever so slowly from side to side as they browse through the leaf litter. We follow the trail further on, and then, all of a sudden there are lots of tortoises and they are everywhere. They are browsing under the trees, sleeping in the sun, scrabbling over rocks and one in particular is marching its way determinedly down the path towards us. Ellen crouches down to get a picture at eye level but the tortoise is not about to change course. Painstakingly it approaches, 3 meters away, 2.9 meters, 2.8 meters. A pause to rest for a bit. Watching these animals walk is almost as exhausting for us as it is for them, it genuinely looks like hard work hauling their weight around. I do not begrudge them their shell. 2.7 meters, 2.6 meters. The expression on its face seems to say 'this is my path, nice and wide for my shell, very few rocks to climb over, very nice'. 2.5 meters away and time for another rest.
By this point we have more pictures and videos of the tortoise than is strictly necessary. Close ups, far aways, moving, resting, walking, sitting. But we don't move from the path. Now we are just watching and enjoying. I want to know how close he will get.
2.4m. Waiting for a tortoise to approach you takes a fair degree of patience. It is not until he is half a meter away that he seems to notice Ellen still half crouched in front of him. He raises his head. 'Obstacle' you can almost hear him think. 'How big is it?' He stretches his neck upwards and cranes to have a look. Ellen is beginning to look a little nervous, the beak on the tortoise looks like it has a fair bit of power. And then the tortoise keeps coming, faster than before and hisses loud and hard in Ellen's face, who suddenly has to shuffle backwards, stumbles on a rock and finally sidesteps out of the way as the tortoise lumbers on by.
"Not too close, please!" Shouts Alex from behind us.
"Tell that to him." Says Ellen dusting down her legs.
There is only one source of fresh water on the island, a rain fed pool that filters through layers of basalt to collect in a small pond below. It is next to this water source, which is still relied upon by the locals today, that the pirates built their caves. They are not so much caves it turns out and more a labyrinth of passages hewn through the rock, some natural, some man made. Alex leads us through and we all enjoy some more of his stories about who used to live in them, but the highlight of our excursion is the tortoises and that is what we are all talking about when we climb back aboard the milk float and head back to the village.
Ellen:
Floreana island has a barrel. And not just any barrel. It is a barrel heaped in history. Originally it was used by the whaling ships to exchange messages between boats and to far flung locations across the world. Sailors would address and drop off their mail and then look through all that had been left before. If he found a letter addressed to him or his next destination he would take the letter with him and deliver it. And since then it has become a tradition, and one that the tourists are now continuing. Any post that you wish to send from the island gets put into this barrel, un-stamped. When you drop off your postcard, the established idea is that you look through the others already there, just like the whalers used to, to see if any are addressed to a location near your home or along your journey. You then take this postcard in good faith that you will hand-deliver it as and when you can, whether it be a week, month or even years later.
There is only one shop on Floreana island and Alex arranges to meet us all there later that afternoon to buy our postcards - right on the beach outside. We have all kept hold of our snorkeling gear and respective wet suits in case of further opportunity at this beach. When we arrive, Alex discovers that the owner is on the other side of the island and will not be back for over an hour. So opportunity we have! This beach is much bigger than the bay earlier in the day. And far more exposed. The water gets much deeper much more quickly. And the sun has put its self to bed behind cloud on its way to setting. A buffeting breeze has also whipped up. Therefore, the water is far, far colder. To the extent that it hurts my feet a bit when I step into the shallows. George and a few others decide that no, they don't need to go snorkeling again in that temperature. But I'm notoriously reckless with a self-acknowledged tendency to show off. So I, clad only in bikini, was the first in the water, and, it turned out, the only one not to go in with a wetsuit. Even our fellow comrade of the morning, Karen, had borrowed a suit from one of the British girls not going in. One by one I'm joined by bobbing, blue lipped faces. "Jesus Christ this is cold!" Matthew, Australian, splutters at me. "Nah! It's fine!" I chatter back at him through clenched jaws. We are already in about 20 foot of water and below us we can see shoals of big, silver fish darting over the craggy, rocky floor. I can also see the huge black, long-spined sea urchins of which we had been warned. The water is darker, the waves bigger and the atmosphere far more dramatic than tranquil. The cold which constructed my veins and blood vessels when I first started to swim feels less and less severe the more I kick fiercely through the waves. I'm reminded of trying to swim in the sea at Sandwich bay far too early in the Summer; gritting my teeth until my limbs become accustomed (aka numb). The temperature feels OK to me now, but I am still occasionally caught by a colder current pushing through the swell of the water. Luke, another Australian, wet-suited, decides it's too cold for him and heads back to shore. We spot the immense shadow of a sea turtle and a few of us swim over to it, further out of the bay, but it soon disappears into the comparative gloom of the water. I head back to some rocks to try and photograph the fish there, while checking we are all still together. When I lift the camera in front of my face, it's really hard to hold it steady against the pull and push of the water. And the shaking of my hands. Oh. Perhaps I should turn back to shore. So, as daredevil as I can be, I pride myself on also paying attention to my own limits. Sometimes. So I let the group know I'm heading in so they don't think they have lost me, and turn back to shore. It is a fair bit further away than I had expected. I can see the figures of George and Katrine standing next to the water, looking out at their partners. I start to paddle back. Flippers make swimming so much faster and easier, but I am still breathing heavily, my leg muscles cramping as I reach the shallows and can look up into the resigned yet mildly concerned face of George. I try to stand up and trip over my own flipper. "Fine! I'm fine!" I sing, hopping on one leg, as graceful as a mermaid, catching my balance. Judging by my core temperature, I seem to have judged my return pretty well and manage to warm up again fairly quickly, with only minimal rubbing of limbs and star-jumps. "Easy!" I tell the members of the group who marvel at my resilience. George hands me my towel and clothes with the resigned, flat expression of someone who desperately wants to tell me off but knows it will do no good.
The shop opens and we all line up to buy our postcards and get the technically illegal tourist stamp in our passports. Then it's back to the home stay for a nice, erm, hot shower, before dinner.
George:
I watch casually as a small group of Eskimos walk out onto the ice, dig a circular hole and start fishing. Then I turn my attention back to Ellen half a kilometre off shore.
"Ellen's amazing, I don't know how she can do that." Says Katrine standing next to me.
"Largely by ignoring common sense I think." I reply trying to work out which of the tiny bobbing heads in the distance is Ellen.
"That sounds like Morten." She says.
"Morten has a wetsuit on."
"It will just take him longer to freeze."
When Ellen does make it back to shore she is shaking with the cold.
"I'm fine I'm fine!" She chatters, hopping on one leg like a flamingo that stepped on a see urchin. I pass her a towel and attempt to rub her arms as she starts doing star jumps in the sand.
"The shop's open." I say when the colour has begun to return to her face.
"Great...lets....go." She replies between the last of her jumps.
The shop is disappointing for its lack of turtle shaped slippers and because everything is priced as if it comes with a free house on the island. Some people flip through the selection of postcards but most have a brief look around and then leave. In the spirit of saving money - my family you get THIS special mention.
GREETINGS FROM FLOREANA ISLAND
Love from George and Ellen.
Cons - not a hand delivered postcard
Pros - you actually get to read it this year.
We trudge our way back to the home stay, drop off our snorkeling equipment and spend twenty minutes relaxing before its off again for dinner with the group. Ellen flips the switch for the hot water and climbs into the shower and I collapse on the bed. The day has been exhausting, but by any measure exceptional. One of the huge advantages of doing an organised tour is that very little time is wasted. There is always another activity to do, and on a place like the Galápagos it works perfectly as you don't want to waste a minute. And it's made all the easier, I think to myself, when the basic accommodation isn't basic at all.
I hear a shout from the bathroom that makes me sit up with a start.
It was the sound of Ellen being electrocuted.
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