The Galapagos Islands

Where do you start describing such a magnificent place...

Despite working on South American time with travelling (the plane leave when the plane leaves!!!!), our first encounter with the creatures of the Galapagos islands was seeing a land iguana at the side of the runway!
Then when we were waiting for the zodiac to take us to the boat, there were about 5 sea-lions laying out on the benches by the harbour just soaking up the sun.

Our accommodation was… interesting. The 7 member crew could not have been more helpful and they kept the boat lovely and clean, but our room still leaked a bit, but that’s not important…. Let’s start with the animals…
The first island was North Seymour and our first encounter with the Magnificent Frigatebirds. The males puff up their red chests to attract a mate and while we were there, this certainly worked! From here we headed to beaches with the lovely Sally Lightfoot Crabs… lots of Iguanas and more importantly, a newly born Sea lion - the mum hadn’t even gone to wash it in the sea, so it was about an hour old.

We have been to red beaches, brown beaches, beautiful white sandy beaches, but the main attraction was at our last island - Espanola, where I saw lots of my Blue Footed Boobies, and they were doing their dance!! We also saw some fully grown albatrosses and their chicks (the chicks are bigger than their parents).
I could write about our experiences for pages and pages…. But the photos are what people also want to see.
To summarise… the Galapagos Islands are unique in so many ways. The animals who inhabit them are unafraid of humans and I hope this long continues. The fact we could swim a few feet away from sharks, sea turtles and sea lions is proof of this. The people who visit these islands need to remember to keep their hands to themselves and also their feet in the paths, that will ensure the place will remain the same for generations.
I’ve had a great time - and when the sun shone on the ocean, the colour of it was just amazing. Now I’m just waiting for the room to stop rocking from side to side… but after 8 days on a boat it will take some time.