Dave & Meredith's Travel Blog

Most people visit the Galapagos by boat which is what we did. You’d think it would be a lazy, relaxing way to see things – just cruising around by boat. There’s where you’d be wrong. They pack your day. It was tough to find free time and when we went to bed, we were exhausted. I know, I know: trouble in paradise. At the beginning of our trip, the naturalist on board said that he’d know people were happy if he saw that they were really tired at night. I have seen that idea mentioned before but it was in the context of training dogs. I suspect there’s a connection in there somewhere.

Every day’s activities varied a bit and there was even a day or two in there that were very different (spending the day in the town of Puerto Ayora on Santa Cruz Island for instance). That said, there was a “standard” set of things in most days. Here’s a typical one of those:

5:45: Wake-up call. Ugh. I paid to be treated like this? Seriously though, we got up early because the animals are not as active in the mid-day heat. It also meant we were usually first onto the island ahead of groups from other boats.

6:00: Breakfast. Food on board was very good. Nothing gourmet but good and plentiful. For certain, no one ever went hungry.

6:45: Ride the dinghy to an island for a 2-3 hour guided walk. Some dry landings, some wet. In addition to the passengers and crew, the two other people on board are a tour leader and a naturalist. Martin Loyola was our naturalist extraordinaire who grew up in the Galapagos. He would lead our walks and was a wealth of knowledge about all things having to do with plants, wildlife, and geology.

Martin explains features of a hawk skull.

9:30: Return to ship and prepare for snorkeling. This always felt great because even though it was still morning, we were always already extremely hot and sweaty. It was very hot and humid every day.

10:00: Snorkeling. The water was almost always warm and very clear. Martin led these as well and would frequently dive to the bottom to point things out.

12:00: Eat lunch and then rest. People usually spent time on the top deck looking for dolphins or whales.

3:00: Dinghy ride again to shore for another nature walk.

The group and a sea lion. Yes, you can get this close.

Waiting for the dinghy after a walk.

6:30: Back on the boat, the tour leader gives a lecture on relevant topics such as evolution, formation of the islands, local wildlife, history of people in the islands, etc. Our tour leader was Richard Parsons who was taking a break from running his lodge named Bellavista in the mainland cloud forest. Richard assisted Martin on every activity and, like Martin, he had very deep knowledge about anything we could ask him, told entertaining stories, and had a great sense of humor.

Richard and a Brown Pelican.

7:00: Dinner.

8:00: Martin gives a short briefing on activities and schedule for the following day.

8:30: Most people went to bed. I tended to stay up with one or two others to work on that day’s photographs.

Overnight: The boat typically navigates to a new island while people are in bed.