Today the students had a free day. Yesterday had been overcast but today was a splendid tropical day. The sun was shining and the sea was a brilliant aquamarine blue. Some of the students went scuba diving while others explored
Tortuga
Bay
. I went with Llyd, Natalie, Jen G., Kevin and Heidi in the morning to visit a ranch where we could see giant tortoises up close. After a brief delay to fix a flat tire, we arrived at the ranch and we were able to wander through the fields to find the tortoises. We found a few resting in a pond and some in a field.
Tortoises can live for over 150 years, in fact Charles Darwin brought three back to London in 1835 and one of them is still alive today in an Australian zoo, 175 years later! These tortoises reach sexual maturity at age 20 and they can weigh between 300 and 700 pounds. One way to tell older tortoises from younger full grown ones is to look at their shells. The younger ones have the familiar geometric patterns on their shells but over time their shells begin to become smoother and more polished. This is from decades upon decades of crawling under brush and having the shells worn smooth. We saw both younger and older tortoises today. After taking lots of pictures and even donning an actual tortoise shell we got back in the truck and our guide took us to our next stop: the lava tubes.
We descended the stairs into the lava tube, which reminded me of a train tunnel. The ceiling of the lava tube was 40 feet overhead and there was a string of electric lights providing just enough light to see by. At times we had to scramble over boulders and at one point the ceiling dropped to only two feet or so and we had to crawl to get through. These lava tubes formed when lava flows solidified at the surface while the molten lava still flowed below. Eventually the lava flowed out leaving the tunnels behind. The tunnel went on for more than a kilometer and when we emerged our guide was waiting with the truck to take us back to Puerto Ayora for lunch.
At this point some of our group went snorkeling while Kevin, who speaks fluent Spanish, found a man with a boat and negotiated a price with him to take Natalie and I for a ride up the coast to a beach. While waiting for Felix, the owner of the boat, to fill his engine with gas, we stood on the dock where there was a sleepy young sea lion hanging out. The animals really are not afraid of man here, and I was able to get quite close and snap a few pictures with the Thomas G. Thompson in the background.
Felix picked us up in his boat, “Rey de Reyes”, the “King of Kings” and we headed up the coast. Along the way were shear rocky cliffs but after a half an hour these gave way to sandy beaches, although they were protected by menacing, black lava-rock reefs. I wasn’t sure we would be able to land but Felix guided his boat between them and landed us on a beautiful, pristine beach. Well, almost. It was disappointing to see that there was trash scattered here and there. It is frustrating to think people would do this at a place like the Galapagos, so I spent a little time picking up the trash to take back with us.
Then we explored the beach. I found two sea turtle tracks coming up onto the sand dunes and we could see the tracks of marine iguanas in the sand, a single squiggle line (from the tail) with footprints on either side. We walked under a tree and heard a rustling and looked down to see dozens upon dozens of hermit crabs scurrying away from us. Later we went for a swim and Kevin went snorkeling then after a couple of hours we got back in the boat and headed back. Later that evening a film team from the BBC who were shooting for National Geographic came to the hotel we were staying at and showed us a 7-minute clip of AMAZING footage of the Galapagos. Be sure to look out for that series when it airs in a year or so.
Tomorrow we head to the ship.
