For Sunday, our final morning on the ship, we were “bags out at 6:30” with breakfast at that time as well, for a 7:30am departure.

We took our normal corner of the patio.

We had the longest Zodiac ride of the trip to get to Santa Cruz Island.

Seeing the parking lot full of buses, cars, and noise was a little jolting, actually, after 4 days in paradise and not seeing anything made by humans that wasn’t on the water.

We were headed to the highlands of Santa Cruz, shown way in the background of this photo. Once we got there, below, the terrain changed to rain forest.

We were headed to a private ranch where the family runs a restaurant and lodge. The made us put on rubber boots because there are fire ants everywhere.

Why we were here? Giant tortoises. Tortoises are legendary in the Galapagos, known as the architect of the island, similar to elephants being the architect of the jungle in Africa. They are the largest land animal here, have plenty of resources and no predators, so that’s what allows them to get so big. The name even comes from them: the original explorers who came across the islands were fascinated by them and thought their large shells looked like horse saddles, and movement, although slow, looked like galloping. The name stuck. These two were on the side of the road when our busses pulled up. And when we got ready to walk around a bit, they started coming towards us.

That’s my foot there. He just kept coming towards me and finally Omar asked me to step back; one of the rules of all the islands is to keep 6 feet away from all wild life.

These 3 provided a great deal of entertainment for our group.

Not sure what he was sniffing. Or why.

Above and below: practicing some of the photography tips we got from Ramiro.

There are 3 tortioses around the muddy pond: the one dead center, one huge on in the water – no, that’s not a rock – and another in that nook left of center.

We gathered at 9:30 for a light brunch.

Ash had fruit, i had a bean ceviche and chicken and veggie skewers.

We got back in the busses for the 30 minute ride to the docks, then crammed into a ferry for a 5-minute ride to Baltra Island, where the airport is.

From there it was about 8 minutes to the airport. Roberta said “depends on how often we have to stop for iguana.” At first, I thought she was kidding. Nope. We had to stop 3 times. Once she got off the bus and chased him off the road.

Our last selfie of the trip, taken at the airport lounge.

The airport here is essentially just one gate that handles all 9 flights that come in and out of here. It’s all tarmac stuff, but they open up the back so it goes faster.

We had an uneventful flight to Guayaquil and are staying at the same hotel we were in Tuesday night. We got there about 5pm – note we lost an hour on the way in, Galapagos being Mountain Time and Ecuador Central.

We got settled in our room and were not looking forward to “bags out at 3am” which was needed for our 6am flight to Miami tomorrow, which most of the group is on. As we were leaving to walk around a bit before dinner, American Airlines notified us the flight is delayed 4.5 hours. We were So Happy about that as we’d intentionally planned a 7 hour layover. So rather than go into South Beach for lunch, which we’d discussed as an option, we will have just 2-3 hours to kill probably. Less hassle for us. Then we have a direct, first-class flight to Sacramento, arriving about 10:45pm Monday. As we talked with others, many were in the same boat and aren’t too messed up by the delay. So now, it’s “bags out at 6:30am” and that’s Much Better.

We went back to the same restaurant we had dinner at on Tuesday. I had the above as an appetizer – the description was “spicy beef filled crispy pastry.” How could I resist?

Ash had a shrimp ceviche…

…and garlic pasta with shrimp for his main.

I had the ribeye with a mushroom risotto. I’d come into this trip thinking I was going to be my beef on, thinking these parts were like Brazil or Argentina. Shows you what I know. Being coastal, Peru and Ecuador are heavily seafood based, if you hadn’t noticed. So it was a nice way for me to end it. I’m kind fished out.

With that, I’m going to close with my traditional “Final Thoughts” for this trip, and boy, this one will be tough.

1. I’ll start with Peru since I’d intended to do this when the portion of the trip was over but ran out of time. What I appreciated most about that trip was the history. We learned a lot about the people who were here for thousands of years before the Incas, and also about how cultures were morphed once the Spanish Catholics arrived and tried to convert everyone. In the cathedral in Cusco, where we couldn’t take photos, we spent a good deal of time studying a version of The Last Supper that hung there. Instead of bread and wine, it was guinea pig, corn, and papaya. As someone who was raised as an “it can only be THIS way” Catholic, I found this amusing and refreshing. My spiritual worldview today supports that idea that, yes, we all have different gods, because god interacts with us in ways that will make sense to US, not necessarily everyone. I appreciated how this supported that.
2. The Galapagos experience was a revelation. It’s hard to describe the impact of 97% of these islands being a national park and therefore protected. Everything is wild, and all human interaction is designed for minimal impact and to not interrupt what nature does so beautifully, without any judgment as to what’s good or bad. It just is, it’s just nature doing it’s thing, and the experience here is heavily science-based. The naturalists have to file daily reports on what they saw, upload photos, etc., to keep the cataloging going. As a result of this, new species are identified all the time. Because evolution is constant.
   • Something I haven’t talked about yet: the park system tightly controls visitors. First of all, as an individual, you can’t just book a flight to the Islands, a hotel on Santa Cruz (the only island likely to have them) and go out exploring. You Have to be With A Guide at all times. It’s required. The hotels will do some day trips but you won’t get the full experience that way. So boats it is, and the park system limits to total number (80-100 max). Each one has to be registered, and the park system determines where they can go and how long they can be there, to manage how many people are in one place at one time. So if you’re Jonathan, the Expedition Leader, you plan your outings on the itinerary set by the park system.
3. I had this moment on Darwin Bay yesterday where I teared up, I was so moved by the natural beauty of the water and the wildlife that was Everywhere and did not care that we were there. Since it’s been under protection for over 200 years, and there were never any big settlements on the majority of the islands – in fact, explorers thought they were worthless – the wildlife doesn’t know that we could be potential predators because they’ve never experienced us that way. Very different from our experience in Africa.
4. I’m glad that I snorkeled. I hadn’t decided that I would until our intro briefing when Jonathan said, multiple times, that 50% of the experience occurs underwater. I may or may not ever do it again.
5. Once again, the tour company was phenomenal. This trip wasn’t cheap but, having experienced this level of expertise in Africa, we knew it would be worth it. And it was. On 3 fronts:
   • Logistically this was a more complicated trip. Five flights if I counted right, plus lots of bureaucracy to get on the island so lots of paperwork, fees, etc. And all you do is show up. The “bags out” thing is so you don’t have to drag your luggage around, they do it for you. Even checked it for us. We showed up at the airport this morning, Adriana gave us our boarding pass and we got on the plane. Simple. And they brought it to our room this evening, just like that have every other place we’ve stayed on this trip.
   • Educationally, this was even more overwhelming than the Africa trip. So Much Information Shared Every Day starting in Cusco. It’s both appreciated and exhausting. The woman who met us at the airport today, on the bus to the hotel was telling us more than we ever cared to know about Guayaquil, and I just wanted to scream “shut up already, we don’t care!” Because, speaking for me and Ash, we are pretty done. (And it doesn’t help that now I’m sick, picked up a cold yesterday and today is much worse. Yay.) But in general, the education you get I appreciate so much.
   • The quality of the food was better here. The food at the safari lodges was very geared for Amercian tourists who might not be all that adventurous. So we didn’t feel like we got a feel for what the locals ate. Here, in both Peru and in Ecuador, real attempts were made to introduce us to knew things which of course we love.
6. This is getting long so I’ll end with this: the air in the Galapagos was Amazing. I’ve never experienced anything like it, and it’s hard to describe. But I noticed it as soon as we walked out of the airport. I’ve never had a breeze feel this good – an interesting combination of warm and cool. It might be because of the cooler waters that it’s known for mixed with the warmer air – it was 79 today, Fall-coming-into-Winter. Whatever it is, I loved it. It made relaxing on the observation deck of the boat heavenly.

And that, my friends, is enough out of me for one trip. Did you enjoy it? We loved having you a long as always.