Feb 20
We have spent the last few days exploring San Cristobal - tomorrow we head to another island.
We were watching the sea lions yesterday and saw something really amazing - all the little ones were playing and jumping and they body surf in the waves - we never knew that sea lions body surfed! They like to play with items in the water - a stick, a stray shoe....they toss it about and carry it with them while swimming. They are really adorable - but stinky in large numbers! Lee can sometimes tell if one gets on our swim platform as they do stink.
Today we went to the tortoise breeding center, they collect and hatch the eggs then nurture them for a number of years until they are ready to be reintroduced to the wild, usually at about 5 years old. We saw some up to almost 20 years old (roughly 2 1/2 - 3 feet shell front to back) and down to the youngest which were only about 3 inches long. Then we went to a lovely lagoon for swimming and later to the fresh water lake which is in the crater of an extinct volcano. The birds here are wonderful, the finches are sooooo cute! We can see quite a variety of fish and even sea turtles at the dock where the water taxi drops us off in town. I was washing the bottom of the boat yesterday and a concentric puffer fish was hanging around, and we saw a ray gliding beneath us (the girls were snorkeling while I scrubbed the boat).
So today we bought some food - I miss the US grocery stores although Riba Smith in Panama was pretty darn good! Here in Galapagos they sell eggs 5 for a dollar - but they don't have egg cartons so either you take your own egg cartons or you put them in a tiny bag together and hope for the best on the way back to the dock/taxi to boat. The stores here on San Cristobal are kind of like a 7-11, maybe a bit bigger but not much, so the selection isn't great - but then the boat freezer hasn't been great so I don't want to stock up more...... I think we'll be able to get more fruits/vegetables and other provisions in Puerto Ayora, but we won't be there for a week - then we have to stock for the long sea leg- 21-28 days at sea....
We're having a casserole I bought at Riba Smith for dinner then heading into the town for happy hour our last night at this island, many of the WorldARC boats have already left for other islands so the harbor is looking a bit empty now.
In all likelihood we'll have to motor to the next island, there hasn't been much wind, but with diesel at almost $6 per gallon we don't want to motor too much (and aside from the money I hate the smell!). We'll have to wait and see what the morning brings.
Pauline