Gal-lap-a-laps!!

Got back to Quito from 8 days in the Galapagos on Sunday and it was way too much….I guess that just means I’ll have to talk to you all in person when I get back!
But really, the Galapagos are an absolutely amazing place…somewhat “off the beaten path”, and since literally the entire group of islands is considered a national park, it’s totally safe and really well conserved. I was surprised by the number of people there visiting, but not in a way that detracted at all from the experience.

In short, we flew in around 10:30 Saturday morning to the airport on an island called Baltra—but from there it was a bus, ferry, and then another bus to Puerto Ayora, on the main island of Santa Cruz. We hung out on the beach there until mid day Sunday, and then took a boat about 3 hours to another island called Isabella. It’s the biggest, and shaped like a sea horse! On Isabella, my hostel was literally 20 feet from the ocean. You walked out the door, right onto the sand, past a few hammocks, and into the sea. It was incredible—not to mention, it had AC in the rooms, a rarity in Ecuador! On Isabella we did some hiking around volcanoes that looked like Mars, snorkeling, and played lots of soccer on the beach. Me and the 2 other guys from Raleigh (“ the rough Raleigh all stars”…) ended up undefeated in the Galaps in case you were wondering (against some very futbol pretentious Ecuadorians…)!

At the crack of dawn Wednesday we went back to Santa Cruz, and in the afternoon, visited Las Grietas, 60m cliffs into a really deep canyon that you can jump off. One of the coolest things about the Galapagos is how quickly landscapes change—the cliffs looked a lot like the NC mountains with clearer water, right after being on beautiful beaches, in a rainforest, and on a volcano from outer space. Crazy! The next day we did a day tour of the island of Floreana: hiked up into the highlands, saw the giant turtles at one of the research stations, and then went snorkeling. This time I saw a shark and got to swim with TONS of sea lions. At one point I couldn’t see any other people, just about 20 really adorable sea lions—that was definitely a highlight.

On Friday we had a free day, and I went straight to the airline company in the morning to extend my ticket an extra day till Sunday. That’s something that airline companies in the States need to jump on…it was SO easy to change the flight—literally I walked in the office in my bikini, gave them my name, and they moved it to Sunday. Done. No bs, no waiting, no fees.

Anyway, Friday and Saturday were free days—we went back to Las Grietas, did some snorkeling, rented kayaks, and spent a lot of time just hanging out on the beach, especially Tortuga Bay. It was nice to end the week like that…in my opinion the perfect combination of structured activities and free time.

So now a few highlights: 1. One morning on Isabella I got up early to go on a run down this beautiful path that ran parallel to the beach. I went around a corner and standing right in the middle of the path was one of the huge Galapagos turtles—its extremely rare to see them in the wild outside of the research centers, and here I was basically face to face with one. Just as a ball park, if I had to guess, I’d say its shell was almost 4 ft in diameter! 2. On Saturday in Tortuga Bay my friend Sean and I rented sea kayaks to try and find sea turtles. We saw a bunch, but the coolest thing was as we were looking, a manta ray jumped out of the water, about a foot into the air, soared for a bit, and then dove back under—it was like straight “Planet Earth”. 3. The torta caprese from Il Giardino—the best desert in Ecuador BY FAR…2 layers of chocolate cake with nutella mouse in the middle and a chocolate nutella icing outside…the best $4 ever spent (everyday…)

And the only bad thing to happen all week: Duke winning the national championship?!?! WHAT! Me and the other kids from UNC had been planning to celebrate the 1 year anniversary of our national championship in style but when we found out about Duke we decided it wouldn’t be appropriate (also, half of them got food poisoning that night [or perhaps a physical reaction to the news?...] and weren’t really feeling up to it).

…sooo when I got back to Quito on Sunday it was cold and pouring rain. Apparently the rainy season moved in while we were gone, which I hate, so I’m headed to the beach again tomorrow!

Love you all!
Kate