ECUADOR & GALAPAGOS ISLANDS
August 19 - September 1, 2006
A few very lucky people recently returned from an awesome trip! The trip started off with a few land excursions in Quito, Ecuador - including a ride on the CHIVA EXPRESS through the countryside, lunch and tour at the very exclusive LA MIRAGE RESORT & SPA, lunch and tour at the 300-year-old LA CIENEGA HOTEL / HACIENDA, a ride on the AERIAL TRAMWAY, hiking, relaxing in the Hot Springs and lunch at the TERMAS DE PAPALLACTA SPA AND RESORT, and other tours of centuries-old churches depicting intricate architecture, beautiful stained glass, gold leaf, and more ... you should have been there!
Next, we boarded the GALAPAGOS AGGRESSOR for some of the best diving to be had! We had encounters with 20-30 Whale Sharks ... spent entire dives watching walls of Hammerhead Sharks swim by (in front of us, behind us, above us!) ... Galapagos Sharks ... schools of Spotted Eagle Rays ... Golden Cownose Rays ... Bull Rays ... Manta Rays ... Red Lipped Batfish ... HUGE bait balls ... Yellow-Tailed Surgeonfish ... schools of Dolphin ... Sea Lions ... Seals ... Penguins ... and more! Turtles ... I seen more turtles here in one day than I have seen in an entire week of diving in the Caribbean!
If you have never snorkeled with Sea Lions and Seals, you must put this on your list of things to do! They are not afraid of you and will swim and dart right in front of you. They love to play and check you out!
Along with awesome diving, we also toured the Darwin Research Station ... a must when you go to the Galapagos.
Other tours included land encounters with the Sea Lions. Adult males known as Bulls can grow to be up to 7 feet in length and 800 lbs. If they were in your path, you did not keep walking, you motioned with your hands and had to tell them several times to move ....
Other encounters included the Blue-Footed Booby Birds, Galapagos Penguins, Galapagos Iguanas, and more ....
DO NOT LET ALL YOU READ ABOUT DIVING IN THE GALAPAGOS KEEP YOU FROM GOING! I had read horror stories about the currents and how cold it was. We went in the prime time of year to see the Whale Sharks, and we were perfectly fine in a 3mm wetsuit (JJ ended up wearing her Polartec); there were a couple of dives that were a little cooler, so we added a hooded vest, but unless you were 90 lbs, or very cold-natured, a 5 to 7mm suit was not necessary. Other stories I read included ... "Take an extra pair of gloves, because you will tear them up holding on ...." I took one pair of new Oceanic gloves and came back with NO holes in them! ... and currents, you roll off the panga, go down and hold on at Darwin and Wolf, then when the dive is over, you let go and gradually go up and the panga picks you up; you don't have to swim against the current on the dive unless you want to. (I should add the water was a little warmer than it usually is according to the Captain.) A good thing to do ... I did ... is get online and read the recent Captain's Log of the location you are going to before you go on a trip. Usually they tell you the water temperature and conditions; this proves to be very helpful and give you an insight about conditions ahead of time.
PHOTOGRAPHY ... what can I say, it was challenging underwater! I had also read to not worry with strobes ... they create a lot of drag in current and don't reach past 8 feet anyway; this was true, and because of the rich nutrients which attract the huge number of sharks, etc., backscatter is a problem ... so you shoot using ambient light, which was a new thing for me! So, needless to say I only used my strobes on one dive, leaving me with photos that needed help in an image editor. I have put a few on the PHOTOS page, so please check them out.
Until next time ....
S. Scott