Puerto Ayora is the largest town in the islands and is on the island of Santa Cruz. I don't have exact figures, but I would estimate the population to be around 10,000 people. It had a very touristy vibe to it, as you might expect. There were small shops and restaurants everywhere, and all sorts of souvenirs, t-shirts and the like could be found on and around the main drag in town.
Ships in the harbor:
Our first stop was Darwin Station, which is the main wildlife research institution in the island. Much, if not most of the work done at the station is for giant land tortoises. Lonesome George, who is the last of his particular subspecies, is kept at Darwin Station.
Lonesome George:
I prefer to see animals in their natural habitat, so the station didn't do much for me. This was our first opportunity to see the REALLY big tortoises, however, so that was interesting, if nothing else.
One of the saddleback variety (you can tell because of the "saddle grip" near his neck):
Having Becca next to one of the tortoises gives you a bit of perspective on their size. This one isn't even that big, either.
When we were done at the station, we cruised around town for a while, stopping to look at souvenirs and to get online, which we hadn't done for almost a week. Not surprisingly, very little had happened and we hadn't missed anything.
One of the more entertaining things we saw in town was the fish market. The local animals have figured out that this is an easy meal, so they show up for free handouts. The people working in the market don't seem to mind and made no attempt to get rid of the animals and birds. Check out the video.
We went back to the ship for lunch. In the afternoon, we were taken by bus to a "ranch" some 20-30 minutes outside of town. The land looked like it had been cleared a bit, but it wasn't cultivated or anything. Those lumps out there are giant land tortoises:
There were land tortoises everywhere at this ranch. When we had previously seen them, they were solitary--we'd never seen more than one at a time in the wild. Here, however, we saw more than a dozen of them, sitting, eating and wandering around. They don't appear to interact much, and they don't do much more than sit, eat and wander around a bit. They're extremely slow creatures, and it makes you wonder how it is that evolution favored their gigantic size over other features like speed and agility.
We were also able to see the local duck variety while we were there, which was good as this was one of the few types of wildlife that we were supposed to see on this trip and hadn't see up to this point in time.
Duck size vs. tortoise size:
Becca size vs. tortoise size:
We went down into a lava tube, but unfortunately didn't see the owl that other people saw.
I previously mentioned that what you'd see here was not at all like the dry, desert conditions of most of our previous stops. From all the grass and greenery, you can see that. There were a few flowers in all that greenery, too.
I suppose it's only appropriate to end a vacation with a sunset photo. This was the only day that I remembered to go above deck to get one. The other days, we had been too busy relaxing in our room, recuperating from whatever we had done that day.
If you've been following my entries, you've seen how amazing this vacation was. It's not for everyone, but if you like wildlife or photography, or just want to go somewhere totally different, the Galapagos Islands are definitely for you. We had a great time and are glad we chose to do it. We waffled on this one for a long time because it was so expensive, but in the end, we felt like we made the right decision. Our timing was good, too. If you follow the news at all, you probably saw that there was an attempted military coup a few weeks after we left Ecuador. This all took place in and around places we had been.
Anyway, enjoy...
These photos are really cool. It's insane how large those tortoises really are.
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