Tortoises, sharks and seals - The Galapagos

  The Galapagos Islands, Ecuador
Monday, February 12, 2007

After 36 hours of travelling, from New Zealand, including an overnight stop in Quito, I finally made it to the Galapagos Islands, which lie around 1000km off the coast of Ecuador, on the equator.

The Galapagos, as I'm sure most of you know, are probably the most famous and important region for ecology and conservation in the world. Most of the animals found on the islands are unique to it - it's also considered to be the world's premier bird-watching spot. Personally I'm not really into the idea of hanging around for ages, hoping to spot a lesser-spotted warbling sparrow-fart, but in fairness some of the birds here are quite cool. There's a kind of duck which has blue feet, improbably named the boobie, , the famous flightless cormorants and the most famous of the lot (but also probably the dullest), the Darwin Finch. Now the reason for its fame is this little creature provided Darwin with the key to his theory of evolution. There's around 10 different species of finch on the islands, all with differing characteristics, mainly at the beak. Each bird is uniquely suited to the island it lives on, so a bird living on an island with lots of hard seeds would have developed a beak to break them open - others have longer beaks, ideal for burrowing in the ground looking for worms, etc. I won't bore you too much with anything more on the theories, suffice to say Darwin, with the help of his mates, figured that these birds had adapted to their environment, hence they evolved, hence he pissed off the god-squad and probably changed the way we look at the world more than any single person before him.

But as for the land animals, my first clue that this place was a bit special was on arrival at the hotel - I was unpacking and heard the unmistakeable sound of snoring coming from beneath my feet - I wandered down to the have a look and found a seal asleep under the terrace with a couple of marine iguana's for company.  A few weeks ago in Australia, we got pretty excited about being allowed onto a beach to stand with in 20 feet of a seal colony, and here was one asleep right in front of me

Just chilling

 

- the iguana's were just sun-bathing and are quite revolting creatures to look at! They also have a nasty habit of regularly snotting projectiles out of their noses - apparently this is them getting rid of accumulated salt, but fairly grim nonetheless!

Probably the most famous animal, though, are the giant tortoises - they really are huge and also quite noisy - they make a weird hissing sound when you approach them, as if to say, back off.

So you reckon you can outrun me then!

 

But on the basis that even I could outrun one of these guys, you can get pretty close to them. I'm not sure if this is that ecologically sound, getting so close to the wildlife, but if the authorities let you do it, who am I to argue - certainly makes for a better experience.

However, my main purpose for coming here was, you guessed it, for diving. On one of the trips, a welsh guy called Gareth was on the boat - turned out that he's in charge of the main research station on the island (Darwin Station) and is basically scientist in chief of the islands. He was happy to let us know that we were privileged to be diving here - he reckons that whilst the land life is good, it's under the water that things get really spectacular and after 6 dives, I'd be hard-pressed to argue. Because of its position, the islands provide sanctuary for fish, whales, rays,

The Galapagos Pele

sharks, etc from the cold pacific currents - it's also a fantastic place for food, with the sea being full of incredibly rich nutrients. Hence, every major fish group seems to be represented and in abundant numbers. Ironically, my last days diving here, also proved to be the best of my entire time away. I should point out that from this point on, there won't be anymore diving as the places I'm visiting form now on don't really have any diving, so Mum, you can relax a bit now!

Anyway, back to the dive - on this particular day we saw, in no particular order, 3 kinds of rays, Hammerhead sharks, Galapagos sharks (a close really of the Great White and a nasty piece of work), numerous white tip reef sharks, eels of numerous descriptions, a shoal of barracuda and the highly rare bat-fish. But strangely the highlight of the dive was a shoal of fairly standard fish -

Somebody order mushy peas?

 

what was astonishing  about this particular shoal was its size. We later estimated it to be around 20 metres high and at least 30 metres across - that's an awful lot of fish! It was simply so large it was impossible not to get inside it and it was a truly incredible experience.

Once we'd finished the dive we went to a little bay for a bite to eat, and came across a group of seals playing in the shallows. We jumped in, kind of expecting them to swim off, but no, they came and played with us, until we had to leave. It was, again, an awesome experience - they seemed to take great pleasure in swimming at you really quickly and then darting off at the last instant

Hellooooooo

- I think the point is, thy know they're cool and just like to remind you of the fact!!

And then back into the water for the last dive - and this time we stumbled on some form of shark motorway! Tons of sharks

Nasty bastard

 

just going with the current onto whatever feeing ground they fancied - again - awesome!

So, in short, for any of you who've ever dived or ever wish to dive, come to the Galapagos - there's a reason it's regarded as one of the greatest diving sites in the world

Leaving here, this is the first place I've really wished I could have spent more time - I know I've just scratched the surface of what this place has to offer, and a week just isn't long enough - but if I don't leave then I'll miss out on other stuff - oh the dilemma!

So, from here, back to Quito for a couple of days and a chance to visit the Equator and then onto Peru and the lost Inca cities.

Rob

PS - Go and find any Aussie's you know and laugh at them - it's only a small consolation, but a consolation nonetheless!! Perhaps I should just skip the rest of my trip and go and watch the World Cup in the Caribbean??