Thank goodness we rested on the Saturday because from lunchtime on Sunday to midnight on Monday we were fraught with computer issues in South America and Europe. Manual check-in in Quito took 4 hours and delayed the plane. Upon arrival in Amsterdam the airport was recovering from severe storms that prevented operation, meaning our flight …
We arrived at Baltra Island after an overnight passage. Disembarkation and transfer to the airport took place. Whilst at the gate we saw two Land Iguanas to add to the species list . The Latam Airbus 319 was fully booked so with a short runway and a heavy load we refuelled in Guayaquil, the major …
Around 5:30 a.m. we entered the caldera of Genovesa Island. This is all that is left of a shield volcano now flooded by the sea and large enough to accommodate many ships near the rim where the water is shallower to allow anchors to be dropped. Again visits were time limited and also the numbers …
Today we started at sunrise with a panga ride to the red beaches (mostly iron oxide) of Rabida Island. When disembarking we were greeted by pelicans and sea lions whilst across the vegetation covered berm was a saltwater lagoon with a colony of American Flamingos engaged in feeding with their heads in the water. Alongside …
After a very early morning journey we stopped at Santiago Island. Here is a complicated mass of ash and spatter cones and blocks of tephra now being eroded by the sea in addition to differential weathering along the guano spattered cliff sections. We witnessed this in Buccaneer Cove on the northwest coast of the island. …
We repositioned overnight across the Equator to Baltra Island. During the afternoon we travelled by panga to Las Bachas beach. This amazing ‘organic’ white beach consisted of eroded shells and coral linking tephra headlands and backed by Lechos trees, mangroves and lagoons which are the feeding grounds and home to American Flamingos, Great Blue Herons, …
Having crossed from Santa Cruz overnight, at 6:00 a.m. we dropped anchor off the island of Floriana – the smallest of the inhabited islands with a population of around 200 people. A panga cruise took us around a bay west of Punta Cormorant. Here the lava flows had either slowly cooled or reached the sea …
After an overnight journey we anchored off the harbour at Puerto Ayora on Santa Cruz Island. The highlands of the island have a rich variety of plant life – dense forests including the local Lechos trees, orchids and mistletoe, sugar cane, cacao, coffee and bananas. The first visit was to the Charles Darwin Research Station …
We arrived at Punta Vicente Isabela at 06:00 after an overnight crossing of this part of the Pacific and, at midnight the Equator, taking us into the Southern Hemisphere. We took a panga (dinghy) cruise along the coastline where we saw the remains, following a destructive collapse, of the Volcan Ecuador. There were many sea …
Today we flew from Quito to the Galápagos Islands and at lunchtime embarked upon the MS Santa Cruz II before moving to a remote part of Santa Cruz Island for our introduction to the area.