Tomorrow is the start for the next leg of the World ARC, Santa Cruz to Hiva Oa in the Marquesas, the longest leg in the entire really around the World.  Almut, Rainer, Caecilia and Achim left the boat a couple of days ago and the new crew, Anna and Stefano arrived the same day they left.  Iain also arrived but he has to go back home to take care of a family emergency so we will be only 3 for the long leg to the Marquesas.   The focus now is on last minute provisioning the boat, safety briefing for the new crew and small boat jobs. 

 

In the 2 ½ weeks here in Galapagos, we’ve certainly seen a lot.  After San Cristobal and Isabela, Santa Cruz is the third island where we got to spend some time.  Isabela is probably my personal favorite because of the abundance of wild life. 

San Cristobal

 

The advice is not to use your own dinghy in San Cristobal to go ashore as the sea lions will take possession of it and leave it in a degenerate state in no time.  So everyone takes water taxis to get ashore.  When I first set foot on the dock, the initial impression was simply overwhelming:  sea lions everywhere.  You literally have to scramble over them to get ashore.  They don’t mind as long as you don’t step on them but they will also not move an inch to get out of your way!  Interestingly, they don’t smell bad like the ones in San Francisco.  The second impression is that the town is a very nicely done seaside resort with lots of nice restaurants and a beautiful boardwalk where you encounter not just sea lions but also pretty good sized iguanas everywhere.

The beaches in Puerto Baquerizo Moreno, San Cristobal, are dual use!

 

The WARC yellow shirts had installed themselves in the attractive Rock café and most everyone on the rally who had arrived in San Cristobal showed up for happy hour the evenings.  Our schedule was chock full with tours, starting the day after our arrival with a nice tour to a local island where we could see frigate birds and other animals close up.

Magnificent Frigate Bird

Blue Footed Boobie – this one doesn’t have blue feet.  The more successful they are at catching sardines, the bluer their feet will get.  This one is just a starter hunter but he didn’t mind that I approached to l meter!

Great Frigate Bird

Galapagos sea lion

It is prohibited in Galapagos to explore anywhere without the assistance of a certified nature guide.  These guides universally added quite a bit of color to our tours, some even had a sense of humor!

 

Iguanas and Kicker Rock!

Striated Heron

These crabs are 20 cm across!

 

My favorite tour on San Christobal was to Kicker Rock where I did a couple of dives when everyone else on the team snorkeled.  I have been just recently qualified as a scuba diver and a dive such as kicker rock is definitely a challenge for me.   It goes down to 20 meters on a steep rock wall and there is some current and fishes everywhere.  I saw 8 sharks including 2 hammerhead sharks, manta rays and countless other colorful fish.  I’ve often seen those in snorkeling but at kicker rock they are supersized.  We were very fortunate to have excellent visibility as well which made it an even better experience.  In addition to the hammerheads, the highlight of the dive was a cloud of fish, maybe 30 meters across.  They are 10-15 cms long and non-descript but swim in a very close formation.  The dive guide told us to stay very close since the masses of fish eliminate all light and visibility.  Sure enough, you swim into the cloud and suddenly it turns pitch black!  After a while, you see what looks like little stars on a night sky which is in fact daylight showing through the cloud.  Some of the snorklers at the surface could see the same cloud of fish and saw a shark enter the cloud with mouth wide open – as luck would have it, we didn’t see that shark!

 

Another favorite tour was to a turtle breeding center where we could admire giant turtles from close up!

Hello – better get out of the way if this guy comes at you!

One of Darwin’s finches, a Geospiza

Mockingbird!

Last evening in San Cristobal

On the water taxi back to the boat

 

Isabela

 

It is over 80 miles from San Cristobal to Isabela and we departed in the wee hours to get there during daylight.  It is good we did because much of the usable space in the Isabela anchorage protected from the Southeasterly swell was pretty much occupied by a freighter at anchor and a number of tourist boats on moorings or anchor.  We managed to grab one of the last protected places – but a couple of days later the tide got so low that we moved to the entirely unprotected area of the anchorage, joining the rest of the fleet, rolling heavily.  Even catamarans were complaining! 

 

Isabella is quite different from San Christobal.  It is less developed and the town is ½ mile away from the harbor.  Importantly, that meant that the WARC meeting place, the Iguana bar, was quite aways from the dock so less people were doing the treck for the 5pm happy hour ashore – we made it only once.   But the Kincsem team was undeterred:  Another gruelling set of great tours were duly executed and G&T’s were taken on board  – check out these pictures!

Who’s the boss here?

This unfriendly looking fellow is a marine iguana, found only in the Galapagos.  Don’t want to stumble over him in the dark!

This blue footed boobie is obviously a more successful specimen than the other one above with brown feet.  I’m told the bluer the feet, the more success with the female boobies!

Two beautiful white footed specimens from Bad Homburg enjoying the snorkeling

Rare orange iguana or normal iguana who rolled in orange sand? 

 

Iguanas bar

Nazca (not Nascar) boobie on a little fleck of rock off the coast

Seahorse - thanks to Rainer!

Seriously Turquoise fish – Apple Photos is struggling to identify it!  Could it be a Parrot Fish??

 

Giant sea turtle

Galapagos Penguin. 

Los tunelos – the Tunnels.  To get here the motorboat we were on had to get through the high surf off the beach.  On the way back out in particular, this caused a few hair-raising moments where the boat seemed precariously close to capsize, particularly with 3 guide dudes on the super high flybridge above!

Anous – a specie of sea bird

Grove billed ani, a kind of cuckoo.  Interestingly, all flowers of endemic plants and all animals in the Galapagos are either white or black.  The color strain is completely missing.

On the 17 km volcano hike; the last eruption was a mere 5 years ago

So this colorful grass hopper must be an import?

Still on the volcano hike.  Rain hit just a few minutes later …

 

On the way back from the volcano hike we stopped by a farm for some fresh fruit and vegetables.

Cleaning all purchases before storage to get rid of lavae….

Santa Cruz

 

No more tours here in Santa Cruz but there is some provisioning to be done.  And, of course, some boat repairs.  The forecast for the long haul to the Marquesas looks light, too light.  At least two days of motoring lie ahead.  So after taking on 400 liters of diesel in San Cristobal, we are taking on another 300 liters here in Santa Cruz.  A simple operation.  A water taxi arrives with plastic barrels of diesel.  The friendly local running it has an electric pump which he connects to a 12V battery standing in the boat with some clamps.  Bingo, the fuel is flowing!  As always, the yellow shirts are doing a super job here, personally sheparding the fuel boat to all the boats which need fuel – which is everyone!

On the anchorage at Santa Cruz

Team Kincsem for the Galapagos