The boat started sailing towards San Cristobal Island at
around 2.00 am so we were again being thrown around quite a bit over night.
Today is Pauls birthday so he opened his cards over our
early morning coffee and then at 6.00 am the boat started a tour around Kicker
Rock.
We saw it as the sun was rising
and it was quite a spectacular site.
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| Sunrise |
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| Kicker Rock shortly after sunrise. |
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| Kicker Rock |
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| Kicker Rock |
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| Kicker Rock at 6.30 am. |
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| Kicker Rock at 6.30 am. |
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| Kicker Rock |
At 7:00 am we were taken to snorkel along the rock and
through one of the gaps in the rock.
A
Pacific Green Turtle swan right under me.
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| Pacific Green Turtle swimming under me. |
We returned to the boat for breakfast and it sailed nearer
to the town of Puerto Baquerizo Moreno on San Cristobal Island which is the
capital of the Galapagos Islands, which only took about half an hour.
San Cristobal Island is one of the 4 inhabited islands with
a population of 6000.
We had the
opportunity to visit the town for an hour or so.
5 of the guests left the boat here as they
were only doing a 4 day/3 night tour and another 3 joined.
The town is very small and has several
hotels, hostels, restaurants and gift shops.
We had a walk around and bought t-shirts and post cards (needed in a few
days time to take part in a traditional event).
There were sea lions everywhere.
We even saw one on the front of a restaurant and others blocking the entrance
to a boardwalk path.
The noise and smell
were a bit overwhelming but they are fun to watch.
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| Puerto Baquerizo Moreno |
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| Street in Puerto Baquerizo Moreno |
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| Street in Puerto Baquerizo Moreno |
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| Monument to Charles Darwin - Paul and Charles shake hands |
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Monument to Charles Darwin, depicting The Beagle, Charles Darwin,
a Giant Tortoise an Iguana and a Cactus
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| Beach on San Cristobal Island |
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| Sea Lions on someone's boat |
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| Even in a restaurant |
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| Spot the Sea Lion |
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| Sea Lion on the landing pier |
We went back to the boat for lunch and then had a nice long
rest period during which we did some washing.
On the upper sundeck there are washing lines all around the side of the
boat with substantial sized pegs.
During
the day clothes and towels dry quickly.
One guest
went up to collect her clothing before going to bed one night to find a load of
birds sitting on the side with their backsides over the washing line and all her clean clothes were now covered with bird
droppings.
That taught us to always take
our clothes back to the cabin before dinner each night.
The next event at 3.00 was to the Interpretation Centre in
the town and we were met by a bus near the pier.
This centre tells the story of the human
interaction with the Galapagos Islands.
It was very interesting but there was no air conditioning in the
building and there were many other tours going on at the same time so it was
difficult to hear our guide.
Fortunately I was already aware of most of the information given from the research I
had done before coming on the trip.
Charles
Darwin visited the Galapagos Islands for 5 weeks in 1835
at the age of 26 travelling on HMS Beagle. He
collected thousands of species of flora and fauna and took them back to Britain
for experts to examine in more detail.
It was easy to catch the birds and other creatures as they had no fear
of man and out of curiosity would come very close.
The big mistake made by Darwin was in not
identifying which island the bird specimens had been found on.
However he only visited 4 of the
islands.
He had been more careful with
recording plant species.
Darwin went on
to study how the creatures had originally got to the Galapagos Islands and this
led to his “Survival of the Fittest by Natural Selection” theory as the
descendants of all these creatures must have survived crossing vast oceans and
then adapting to life in a very harsh environment.
He published his book “On the Origin of
Species by Means of Natural Selection” in 1859.
From then on many other expeditions were made to the
Galapagos and so many creatures were killed and taken away as specimens for
research and museums.
This nearly killed
off the wildlife on the islands.
One expedition
alone brought home over 75000 species.
In 1959 the Charles Darwin Research Centre was created on Santa Cruz
Island and it is from here that life on the islands is now studied, with
species being captured and then released unharmed after necessary data has been
recorded.
We were also told that the islands are constantly moving
south eastwards towards the South American coastline at a rate of 4cms per
year.
Science has found that each island
will gradually sink below the sea and be replaced to the north as volcanos
beneath the sea erupt and form new islands.
Evidence of former islands exist to the east where there is a chain of
submerged islands known as Carnegie Ridge.
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| Interpretation Centre, hidden behind vegetation |
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| Interpretation Centre |
We were then given another 40 minutes free time in the town
so we walked along the sea front which was dominated by sea lions.
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| Sea Lions blocking the walkway. We had to go the long way around. |
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| Lava Heron (I think) |
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| Water feature on sea front that maps the Galapagos Islands |
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| Sea Lions on the beach |
When we arrived for dinner, the dining room was decorated
with “Happy Birthday” signs.
They had
realised that it was Pauls birthday and after the main course an enormous cake
was brought out with a “question mark” candle.
We all sang happy birthday to Paul and he blew out the candle and then
the chef cut the cake and shared it amongst the guests and (hopefully) the
staff too.
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| Pauls birthday cake |
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| Paul and Chef Javier |
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