Island hopping in the Galapagos

As we wanted to see as much as possible of the Galapagos and our cruise was only 5 days long we decided to fly to the islands a few days before the cruise started. We landed in a tiny airport on Baltra island, a desertlike island with cactuses and leafless trees. From there we crossed the canal to Santa Cruz, one of 4 inhabited islands in the Galapagos and home of Puerto Ayora, the main town. A lot of people only pass through Puerto Ayora on the way to their cruises but there is also things to do in town. We quickly went and booked ourselves on a diving tour the following day and the rest of the afternoon we walked around in town and got into the much slower pace compared to Quito.

Yachts in Puerto Ayora, Santa Cruz

When we had finished our diving the following day we took a speed boat to the island Isabela. The two-hour ride was easily described as bumpy. I sat and stared at the horizon so not to get seasick. Another girl on the boat didn't do the same I guess as she had to hand over the back of the boat and vomit. We tried to help her with water, paper and Mentos while a nice German woman in her sixties was documenting the whole episode with her camera...

Isla Isabela turned out to be a small paradise. The "town", Puerto Villamil, was pretty much a beach, a sandy main road, a lagoon with a few pink flamingoes and some quarters of houses inland. People were really friendly and didn't care too much that our spanish (ok, Yarden's spanish and my spanified French) did leave a lot to wish for. We quickly established contact with the main tourist guru in town, Pablo. He fixed us up on a horseback tour, he negotiated hostel prices for us, his wife laundered our clothes and they fed us coconuts. Another imortant person on our stay was the owner of Restaurante Arenitas, who fed us set menus of breakfast, lunch and dinner. We also met a nice couple from Quito, Juan Pablo and Margarita, who functioned as our translators as soon as we were stuck in misunderstandings (yes, that did happen...).

Restaurante Arenitas, our main foodplace

Karin with the beach and Puerto Villamil in the background

The post office of Isabela

Breakfast in a local restaurant, Isla Isabela

One day we went on a horsebackriding tour to the volcano Sierra Negra. From the sun at the beach we went by truck through the jungle and up, above the clouds where our horses were waiting. We looked like a bunch of bandidos in hats, sunglasses and shirts tied around our faces in order to protect ourselves from the dust from the track, the sun and the heat. When we reached the volcano area we got of the horses and walked around in the lava fields, crept through lava tunnels and enjoyed the amazing landscape. It felt like we had landed on Mars.

A walk in lava land

Pablo, our tour guide

Yarden, natural born cowboy

Volcano Sierra negra

After three days on Isla Isabela we had to Santa Cruz at 6 o'clock in the morning in order to catch up with our cruise. And we know - it's a though job, but someone's gotta do it!!

Blowing lavasand off the hands

Maybe she should have changed her name to Kahlo instead of Cohen...