Galapagos Adventure - Day 3 - June 16
If you have been wondering where in the world we have been, here is our location on Find a Friend.
By the time you read this page we won’t be there any more.
The welcoming reception was very nice. There are 36 people in our tour group. Of that 14 are under the age of 19. They were all required to sit together at dinner except for our two grandchildren who are 9 the next youngest are 14.
The name of our group onboard the Santa Cruz II is the Blue Footed Boobies. Each youth was given a blue footed booby stuffy at dinner.
Wendy our Tauck representative explained the details of our flight and check in on our cruise ship. We will depart the hotel at 6:15 am for an hour drive to the airport. We will fly 45 minutes on a local airline Latam flight 1415 to the port city Guayaquil. We will stay on the plane while other passengers deplane and board and 30 minutes later take off for Baltra. The flight to the Galapagos from Guayaquil is 90 minutes.
There is an X-ray scan of all luggage going to the Galapagos. The authorities are searching for any fresh fruit, nuts or seeds that could become an invasive species.
Here are few final comments regarding our visit to Quito.
We had the most delightful local guide for our tour of Quito. Gabriella and Eleanor became friends.
Basilica of the National Vow. The construction began in 1895. This Roman Catholic basilica remains technically unfinished. Local legend says that when the Basílica is completed, the end of the world will come.
There was also a Jesuit church that we visited - The Church of the Society of Jesus. Construction began in 1597 and nearly every square inch is covered in gold leaf. The church took 170 years to build. This provided generations with construction jobs in Quito.
While walking through the plazas we saw what appeared to be people eating ice cream cones. However we never saw an ice cream cart. Upon closer inspection we saw vendors with bowls of meringue infused with fruit and scooping it into ice cream cones. No problems with refrigeration or melting. Meringue is made by whipping egg whites and sugar.
One more equator fun fact. The hours of daylight are consistently from 6:00 am to 6:00 pm. Twelve hours of sunlight per day all year round.
Yay! We finally arrived in the Galapagos. It would be nice if they spent five dollars to fix the “L” on the sign at the airport.
Several planes arrived simultaneously and hundreds of travelers lined up to clear immigration and customs with two open kiosks. Even our ship’s captain apologized for the poor service. But our intrepid group of 36 persevered and we transited to the pier to board our ship.
At the disembarkation pier there was a sign with all the letters. We could see our ship in the harbor.
We were greeted on the pier by a snoozing fur sea. He did not take notice of the crowds passing by.
The pangas (inflatable Zodiacs) from the ship were waiting for us at the pier. We departed in three groups of 12. There is a special hand hold with the crew that keeps the passengers from falling into or out of the pangas.
Everyone wears a life jacket while in the pangas. That’s good advice for anytime people are onboard small boat.
There she is. Our home for the next five days Santa Cruz II. Our Tauck group is 36 passengers another group of 30 German and Indian tourists are also on board. According to the caption we have 66 passengers and 65 crew.
Mother nature did not disappoint us as we made our first wet landing on the beach. Just a few steps away we saw our first marine iguana.
The sally lightfoot crabs were abundantly visible on the rocks along the beach.
Just like on our African safari with the Big Five and the Ugly Five the Galápagos has the Big Fifteen. We have seen a few already. I will detail the Big Fifteen list in the next blog post and you can help me keep count.
Tomorrow morning we need be on the aft deck at 6:30 am to collect our snorkeling gear. Once again it is get up and go. It is always get up and go have fun.