I’ve spent this last week on Santa Cruz. Monday thru
Thursday was mandatory for class, and the weekend prior for my own adventures.
Having found this awesome room for rent away from the entire tourista ruckus
and the blasting of Ave. Charles Darwin, I spent many evenings on the large balcony,
listening to music and conversing.
Arriving early Friday morning (the boats leave San Cristóbal at 7am), the two-ish hour boat ride was smooth
(at least I think it was, but then again I pass out once my butt hits the
seat), and two very nice naturalists (mis amigos) met me at the dock and took
me out for breakfast (bolon = awesomeness).
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| Fishing boats tend to attract carnivores and scavengers |
On Saturday mi amigo and I took a taxi to Los Gemelos up in
the highlands. Los Gemelos (the twins) and two collapsed magma chambers located
within the Scalesia zone of the highlands. After the business of the main town
of Santa Cruz, the twins create this peaceful quietness that makes you smile
with appreciation for everything you have.
We took a taxi up to Los Gemelos with the intention of riding bikes back to Puerto Ayora; what an exciting ride. First of all, it was a much longer ride to Los Gemelos than I had originally thought and we left pretty late in the day. So here we are, riding crappy bikes with minimal breaks (my tires definitely could have used more air in them), speeding (well, racing is a better term) down a (thankfully) paved road without helmets (because who needs those), while trucks and taxis (smaller trucks) are speeding by us. Oh yeah, and the sun was setting, which was absolutely beautiful to see, but also potentially very dangerous because there were no lights on the bikes. It took a little over an hour of racing down from the highlands, and when we arrived back in Puerto Ayora it was pretty dark. But such a great ride! Definitely worth the risk of putting my life in the hands of the medical ‘experts’ on the island.
I’ve found another beautiful beach, this one on Santa Cruz. Although
it’s approximately a 40-minute walk, Tortuga Bay is a long, white-sand beach
with powerful rolling waves. The sand is super fine and soft, yet get’s into
everything, which really is okay because the beach is so beautiful. You can’t
really swim along the ocean because the current is too strong, but the lagoon
around the corner is perfect as it is warmer than any other water I’ve been in
on the archipelago. There are numerous marine iguanas swimming along the
mangrove roots or laying on the beach, as just as many touristas getting way to
close to them to take pictures. There’s a 2-meter distance you’re supposed to
keep between you and any creature living on the archipelago (this excludes
humans of course). It’s called Tortuga Bay because the sand dunes are a
breeding ground for the sea turtles. Thankfully, it’s protected under the
National Park so there are no hotels lining the beach upsetting nature.
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| Tortuga Bay |
This week we had class on Santa Cruz (well, it’s basically over, we’re just going on daily excursions), so I was back at Lobo de Mar on a fairly tight eating regime. The rest of the class arrived on Monday and we, well I, had most of the day free because they were scheduled to take their final exam at 2pm (I took mine late afternoon Thursday so I didn’t have to worry about it over the weekend). So instead of sitting with my class listening to presentations, I sat with a LAN travel
agent for 1-½ hours trying to change my return flight to NY in January. I did meet some interesting people. One guy was there because he put all of his electronics into his backpack in the airport in Quito and when he arrived to Baltra they were all gone. Hmmm. I’d be surprised if they were still there. Theft is huge on mainland Ecuador.
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| Land iguana at the Charles Darwin Center |
Tuesday we went to a sustainable farm in the Highlands. The head guy there gave us a tour, stopping every 3-4 meters or so to tell us about a plant, usually endemic. We even got to plant an endemic species, Scalesia pendunculata! My gardening skills came in handy, as were weren’t given a shovel but some kind of flat apparatus that wasn’t very sharp. It’s a pretty cool place though. You can volunteer to work there but for some reason you have to pay, so in reality you’re not really volunteering. Not too mention the pain in the butt it would be to get a visa from immigration for that.
Wednesday wasn’t very exciting, Well, I’m sorry to say I
didn’t do anything that would be exciting for anyone reading this. Feeling like
a cold was coming on, I skipped the 2-hour hike in the gurúa-laden Highlands to lie in bed watching movies I
felt Finding Nemo was appropriate given the length of time I’ve been surrounded
by ocean. Did you know one of his fins was smaller than the other? Apparently
this is an important piece of information that I missed the first time I saw
the movie many, many years ago). By myself. It was truly a great day.
Happy Happy Turkey Day! Oh, and what a day it was! We didn’t
get a fabulous turkey dinner like the rest of American, I mean really, the
National Park is trying to eradicate introduced species on the islands and I
think everyone knows that turkeys are not native to the Galápagos. So no
turkey. But that’s okay because we took a couple boats to Floreana Island 1 ½
hours southwest of Santa Cruz. Floreana is small, desolate island inhabited by
120 people. It has a great snorkeling spot that is restricted to all but the
cruise ships (money and politics), a few lobos, lots of very large Tortugas de
mar, and a Playa Negro (black sand beach). Oh yes, and pirate caves in the
highlands. There is a very interesting story about Floreana. The Galápagos were discovered around 1530A.D., yet it was
decided that they were uninhabitable. I find this fact interesting because
these people sailed all over the world, roughing the open seas and they found
the Galápagos to be uninhabitable? After the
discovery of the Galápagos, pirates and those
crazy enough to get on a ship and cross the ocean would use the Equatorial
islands as a pit stop, to hide gold (which has yet to be found), and to take
tortoises on their ships to use for food when it became scarce. I believe I
read that something like 200,000 tortoises were killed by these assholes. This
is the main reason why numerous Galápagos tortoise species are extinct (e.g., Lonesome
George was the last of his species, and actually thought to have been extinct
until he was found on Isla Pinta), and the four inhabited islands all have
tortoise refuges: the National Park is trying to repopulate the tortoise
population; they are of great importance to the ecosystem. To continue with the
story, the Galápagos
were annexed by Ecuador in 1832, and a group of Germans, Norwegians, and other
Europeans immigrated to Santa Cruz in the early 1920s, with one couple heading
to Floreana. Interestingly, a German family by the name of Angermeyer traveled
to Santa Cruz during this time, where there just happens to be the Angermeyer
Resort. To make a long story a tad shorter, this infamous couple that headed to
Floreana were a tad scandalous, as they had been having an affair while in
Germany, and wanted to get away to a more peaceful and sustainable environment
(boy, were they in for a ride). Because they were both writing home about their
adventures on Floreana, and because people talk, others attempted to do the
same. Sadly they could not handle the extreme differences in their new
lifestyle, and most of these people left, that is, of course, until the
Baroness arrived with her three men (I really don’t know what else to call
them). The Baroness was a crazy bitch and tried not only to tax the two
families already living there, but believed she owned the island as well.
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| Playa Negra |
There was major conflict between the families living on the island, and with a few years one day the Baroness and her ‘main man’ disappear, then someone else dies, and between different stories that are constantly changing, no one really knows what happened in regard to the disappearances (or murders) of those who died on the island. It’s a little creepy walking through the same highlands some 70 years after these events occurred.
After our stroll through the highlands to see the tortoise
reserve and pirate caves we headed back to our respected boats for some
snorkeling and sunbathing. When we did return to Santa Cruz, surprisingly
earlier than expected, I had enough time to call mi familia for a skype
session! I even got to see Joey, which made me want to go to NY after I get
booted from the islands by immigration.
As I had plans to spend one more night on Santa Cruz before
returning home, I had plenty of time to kill before mi amigo returned from
leading a group on Isabela. Therefore I made a spa appointment. I know this has
nothing to do with the ecological aspects of the Galápagos,
but it was fun. I chose a three-hour package (so cheap here!), which included a
sugar scrub, mud (or something) wrap, and an hour-long massage. I’ve never had
a sugar scrub or mud wrap, so why not try it at a cheaper price? The sugar
scrub most likely took off 1/4mm of tanned skin off my body, which seemed to
make me look a tad more gringa, but I’ve got 3 weeks to change that so no
worries. The mud wrap was very interesting. It wasn’t mud though; it was most women’s
dream. I got covered in chocolate to the point it was massaged into my skin,
and then wrapped in plastic and left to simmer for 20 minutes. Even after
washing it off and the massage, I can still smell chocolate. I was so out of it
for those three hours that when I finally came to I had no idea where I was
until I walked out of the room and had to speak Spanish. It was then I was
reassured that I wasn’t in NY. The day keeps getting better too, because I
found a restaurant that has amazing cuts of steak so I had to treat myself to
my first steak in over three months. Carne exists in Ecuador, although steak
unfortunately does not.
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