Galapagos Islands, Ecuador 26 September - 4 October

Day 1

We caught the flight early in the morning from Quito to Galapagos. Because we had booked the trip through Carpe DM travel agents the guy who owned the place took us to the airport and made sure that we got booked in and our boarding passes sorted out.

Our flight landed on a very simple runway in Baltra, the luggage carousel is you walking around looking for you bag rather than a carousel at all! To get to the port we needed to take a bus, a ferry and then  the slowest bus in the world. It took us more than an hour and a half to do about 30kms and this is all on good tarred roads. It was a lot cheaper than catching a taxi, which are all double cab bakkies on Santa Cruz Island, maybe that would have been a better idea in the end?

Not knowing where we were going to stay the night we headed up the street and asked to find the Darwin Hotel, some guy directed us to the next corner and Tess checked out the room, it was very simple and a little dodge but we figured it was just one night before our cruise started the next day so we took it. We were starving and so went in search of some lunch. As we were tucking into our lunch, the first time trying ceviche (fish marinated in lemon juice with tomato, peppers and onion, delicious!), we bumped into an America girl we had seen in Cartagena and on the flight. We invited Tammy to join us, the three of us ended up spending the rest of the day together which was so much fun! We headed to the Darwin centre where they house the giant tortoises (incl, Lonesome George) and some land iguanas.

In the early evening we headed out to The Rock to take advantage of the 2 for 1 drinks special they were running. After a few drinks an American who now works at the embassy in Quito rolled into The Rock, Tammy had met him earlier and so we invited him to join us.  As it transpired he had been in the army and had been in Afghanistan and Pakistan and had been in special security forces for a number of years. He regaled us with some great stories of people who he had been special security for, the most notable being the Dalai Lama! It was a good day and we were now all set to go on our cruise the next day. We were happy campers!

Day 2

The day of the first organised tour/cruise for either Tess or I started rather slowly and we had a chilled morning before we needed to meet on the New Pier in Puerta Ayora to meet the Fragata at 12:30. We arrived on the pier at 12:10 to make sure that we didn’t miss the boat, literally and figuratively! We were a little unconvinced of what we had been told by the travel agents: “Wait on the new pier at 12:30 and someone would come and meet us there”. Sure enough before 12:30 we were ushered onto a water taxi and taken to the Fragata to start our 7 day cruise of the Galapagos.

The Fragata

We met some great people on the boat, most notably the first South African we had met on our travels, Leigh-Ann and her Aussie boyfriend Michael. Also there was a French and American couple, Heinde and Christina, that were really nice and really funny, keeping us entertained through the trip.

As we got on board we were shown to our cabin, single beds on either side of the cabin, but nice and clean with a private bathroom and the hottest shower we had had all trip. Straight away we sat down to some lunch, we were pleasantly surprised at the quality of the food, this boded well for the next week.

Our Galapagos guide for the trip was Ivan, he was great! His English is really good and he loves the islands and the wildlife. It’s amazing to have someone so passionate about his work and home, guiding us around the islands. We loved his sayings too, like: “Dju know guys”, and when asked about seeing wildlife he would say things like “Turtles for sure” or “No guarantee” if we were not likely to see that. All of these in your best Spanish accent of course!

After lunch the yacht headed off on a 3hr trip to our first stop: Santa Fe. We took some motion sickness tablets just before boarding, but even so Tess was not feeling great and needed sit quietly at the back of the boat and take a few deep breaths to avoid disaster. Soon enough and with no bad news along the way we arrived at Santa Fe and got our first taste of the action. On the islands you can really get so close to the animals, it’s amazing. We actually had to get warned by Ivan not to get too close to the sea lions on the beach. And he always says “No Flash!”, apparently this blinds the animals. He is militant about it!

On the walk we also saw Sally Lightfoot crabs, a land iguana and amazingly, a short eared owl, this was only the second short eared owl Ivan had seen on Santa Fe for 20 yrs. When we got to the boat we had our first snorkelling of the trip. We got ourselves suited up and splashed into the water and then followed the rest of the crew around for the next hour. The snorkelling was great, we saw loads of fish, sea lions, golden rays, diamond rays and half a dozen turtles. If this was what all the snorkelling was going to be like it was going to be an amazing trip.

Day 3 - Espanola

We travelled in the night while we were sleeping, which makes thing a little easier on the sea-sickness and also rocks you to sleep quite nicely J. In the morning we landed at Espanola and we were immediately among all the marine iguanas. They pretty much just stay in the path and you have to walk around them. The rest of the walk on the island was mainly focussed on birds and what amazing birds we saw! The blue footed boobies, just love the name, every time one flew overhead I’d say to Tess: “Look a blue footed boobie”. I think she may have got tired of this, but I never tired of it. The boobies also do this cool mating dance where they lift one blue foot after the other, rather cute! We also saw the albatross. Espanola is the only island in the Galapagos that has albatross. They are pretty amazing birds and have a wingspan of about 2.4m. At the end of our walk we saw the Galapagos hawk which was a rare treat.



Tropical Bird

Marine Iguanas in the path



Albatross

The Blue Footed Boobie

After we got back to the boat we went snorkelling and we saw 2 sea lions playing with a feather underwater, swimming around us. They are rather fun. We also saw a big ray and some turtles at the back end of the dive. In the afternoon we headed to a secluded beach with amazing white sand like flour where we could just stroll along the beach, hand in hand like the lovers that we are! Haha!

Day 4 - Floreana

We arrived on Floreana where we headed to a salt lake that potentially has Flamingos during mating season, unfortunately we only found one poor sole, and renditions of Eric Carmen’s “All by myself” began. We then moved on to a beach where Sting Rays are in the very shallow waters ingesting the nutrients from the sand they apparently need, we also saw a shark and some penguins in the very far distance, they were almost too difficult to work out, but the rest of the crew seemed excited about the sighting, so rather than ruin their fun we went along with it.

Stingray in the shallow waters

After we had got back to the boat we went snorkelling around Devil’s Point where the visibility was amazing. The current around the island was pretty hectic and so when we were going with the current we would just float along with it. We had a go against it for a bit which was hard work. We saw loads of fish and many different colours and an Eagle Ray right at end of dive. This was Tess' favourite snorkelling of the trip!

Ivan and Tess at the Postbox

In the afternoon we went to Post Office Bay and the Lava Tubes, where there is actually a postbox, but this is one with a bit of a difference. You can bring your postcard here without a stamp and leave it and hopefully sometime in the future someone comes along and they can then take the postcard and deliver this by hand to the address. We found one for Cape Town and so we have that with us that we will try and deliver in December. Seems like a cool system and can’t wait to see who we are delivering the postcard to.

We went snorkelling from the beach in the afternoon and we saw so many turtles, at least 10! It was absolutely amazing how close we could get to them. One of them was actually feeding just below me, if I put out my hand I would have been able to touch it. They are pretty big when fully grown and seem like such chilled out creatures. I think Crush in Finding Nemo is a really good depiction of what turtles are like J.

Day 5 – North Seymour and Baltra

We had a really early start the next morning, we watched the sun rise on North Seymour island. We needed to do this as the Frigate birds nest on North Seymour and they are in mating season at the moment and so all the males have those amazing red bubbles that they inflate under their chin and then beat their beaks against this to attract the females.

Blue footed Boobies

Black tipped reef sharks around our boat

The rest of the day was pretty chilled as we went to Baltra to drop half our co-sailors at the airport (they had done their 8 days) and we were due to pick up 10 more, but only 2 arrived so we were going to be a small crew for the last 4 days, that was until the evening when an Ecuadorian family of 4 joined us for 2 days, they were ok, but changed the dynamic of the trip a little bit which was a bit of a shame.

Each evening Ivan would give us a briefing of the activities and animals we would see the following day. That evening we found it funny to change Ivan’s white board adding a few funny things, such as adding whale shark and tourists to the bottom of the list the wildlife we were going to see, and adding happy hour with Ivan to the day’s activities. He found this rather amusing too.

Day 6 - Genovesa

Genovesa is a very new island,  a sunken volcano with part missing, now in the shape of a horseshoe, but Ivan calls this the best island in the world. We started off the day with a short boat trip across the centre of what used to be the volcano, all the way along the cliffs we saw birdlife, the Tropical bird being the most notable as well as some fur seals, which we would not see again. At the top of the cliff we started looking at the birdlife and we witnessed a full on fight between 2 Red Footed Boobies over territory, the one finally extracting itself from the other’s grip only to plunge into a lava crevice never to be seen again. A very dramatic start to the day and the girls weren't so happy with the result!

The rest of the walk was much more sedate as we observed the birds going about their business. We saw Red Footed Boobies, Nasca Boobies, Storm Petrels, Frigate birds all with nests and babies and a rare glimpse of the short-eared owl, we also saw numerous other smaller birds too many to mention.  

When we got back to the boat we headed out snorkelling straight away, the water was beautiful and the visibility was good. We stuck to the edge of the cliffs as the water gets very deep very quickly due to being in the middle of an old volcano. We mostly just saw fish and one barbed ray, but it was fun anyway.

After lunch we were off to see a few more birds, we saw lots of night herons, Galapagos Gulls, lots more Red Footed Boobies, Nasca Boobies, Frigate birds, all with young ones. The best thing about the afternoon was the view across the bay of the whole island. All in all another great day.

Galapagos Gulls

Crowned Heron

Us and the magnificient view across Genevesa

Some sea lions posing with our boats in the background

Day 7 - Bartolone and Black Turtle Cove

The next morning we had to hike up an old volcanic island (Bartolome island), there is pretty much nothing on this very small island except lava lizards and a few small snakes. There is however a magnificent view from the top of the mountain of the surrounding islands and of a volcanic rock formation, it is the iconic view that you see on postcards of the Galapagos!

Picture perfect Bartolome Island



The elusive Galapagos penguin

More beautiful views from Bartolome

Our next activity was snorkelling at Bartolome, this was our last snorkel and was really great, the visibility was amazing. There was apparently a shark at the start of the dive, but luckily for us Tess didn’t see the shark otherwise her last snorkel may have been extremely short! We saw loads of fish, starfish of various colours and a few rays. It was a great finish to the snorkelling on our trip!

We had an early lunch on the yacht and then headed about two and a half hours towards Santa Cruz island. There we headed into a mangrove forest on the small boats and we were able to chill in the boats as the turtles went about their business around us. In another section there were loads of little black tipped reef sharks that were swimming around our little boats. Another very cool experience.

That evening as we headed to our last island all 8 of us remaining on the boat were just chilling, chatting and having a few drinks. We were all so relaxed and talking about how lucky we were to be able to be on the Galapagos islands and to have seen all that we had seen, it was such a great evening! Our last evening on the boat would be at anchor which was a pleasant change.

Day 8 – The Plazas and back to Puerto Ayora

The last morning of our cruise started at 6am where we went for a walk on South Plaza. This island is known for its land, marine and hybrid iguanas. We were lucky enough to see all of these on our short walk. The scenery is also really beautiful and there are loads of birds on the one side of the island. After this short visit we boarded the yacht and headed back to Puerto Ayora to finish the cruise.

Land Iguana

Puerto Ayora harbour

The last bit of our time on the islands was very chilled and we caught up with mails, facebook, blogging, laundry and all the other mundane things that need to be done from time to time.

The Galapagos Islands have been such a highlight on our trip. We will forever remember the animals and birds who let you get so close its better than a zoo, the amazing landscapes and scenery that is both stunningly beautiful and archaic at times and the great friends we made on our trip to the islands. A truly once in a lifetime opportunity and experience!

 

Ecuador (Quito & Cotopaxi) 21-25th September

We landed in Quito, capital city of Ecuador and the second highest capital (altitude wise) in the world on Thurs eve, and made our way to our hostel called the Secret Garden. A really friendly place and in no time were sharing a beer with the local crew. (On their roof-top bar, which has the most extraordinary view of the Old Town, especially at night with all the twinkling lights and lit-up Cathedral)

Our mission was to organise our Galapagos tour from a travel agency in the same building. We’d heard some great advice that they could organise a good deal and although we kind of blew our budget by double, we still kind of figured we got a good deal, believe it or not! The only hitch being we would only be leaving a few days later than we hoped. (Galapagos now only started the following Monday).

That same morning we were lucky enough to catch a free walking tour of the Old City of Quito.    (loving the word free after making several trips to the bank to draw wads of cash in order to pay for our trip as well as having Barclays block our debit cards, but that’s another story altogether!). Quito’s Old City, really is pretty! Beautiful old buildings that have been well kept and again, amazing cathedrals and churches.

That night at the hostel we’d signed ourselves up for Pub Quiz after dinner. We teamed up with a lovely Swiss couple, and although we came stone last, we had such a fun eve! Was great to have a laugh with some cool folk!

Now that we had a little more time on our hands we decided to head out and explore a bit of the Ecuadorian countryside. One of the things that Derek and I both have found is how much we’ve preferred the rural and country spots as opposed to big cities, so we quickly made the decision to leave Quito. Our hostel has a sister hostel out near Cotopaxi (which is the highest active volcano in the world) that sounded great. We’d heard they had great hikes and horse riding trails as well as a lovely homely atmosphere, where you could read and relax! Sounded just what we felt like after days of being on the go!

After 2 hours in a minibus, we arrived to higher altitude and a little more chilly weather. This hostel was great in that it felt like a big farmhouse, with long dinner table, cosy lounge, fire and good meals. Derek and I both knew the next few days would be great. We laughed, there was even an outdoor loo with a view – all in line with the hostel’s eco-approach on things!

To mix things up a little, Derek and I opted to sleep in a tent on a deck (which had a covering / awning). At one point a little foolish I thought considering the other dorms and private cabanas had fireplaces for the evenings – but realised soon enough our tent was just as warm with the 5 blankets we had been issued.

First morning, we woke, unzipped our tent and we were faced with the most incredible view ever! An unclouded, yet snow-capped view of the Cotopaxi Mountain. It was breath-taking!

We had a hearty breakfast and soon saddled up for a morning horse ride.  First horse ride in ages, but soon got into it and enjoyed it. We had a beginner rider in our group and because we had an elderly guide who was new to the hostel, we got short changed on the riding time – disappointing as it meant more walking than cantering, galloping. We saw some lovely sights that day.

That afternoon, two of the younger guides (fun American guys) lead us through a meadow, a bit of a forest and even a little rock-climbing until we got to this lovely waterfall! We were all kitted out in hiking stuff, they in shorts, poncho and carrying a bottle of beer! This was the umpteenth time they’d done this walk! Derek then climbed to this point of the waterfall where you jump into the most freezing water – about a 3m drop! Very bravely repeated the act after the camera not quite capturing what it should have – oops! Absolutely soaked and freezing, we trudged home (thank goodness for borrowed Wellies) to a warm fire that awaited us!

The rain continued to pour and pour all night (made the loo trip that evening ever so pleasant!) So much so that Derek and I woke up several times wondering whether or not our expedition up to the Cotopaxi Glacier would in fact happen. Again we unzipped our tent and were not expecting to see what we did… so much snow!!! Every mountain in the area had a snow covering and Cotopaxi was absolutely covered in snow – to the point where you couldn’t tell where the glacier started. We all debated whether or not we had the right gear to be climbing in snow and whether or not we would be able to get anywhere close to the Glacier – and in the end decided it was probably not worth it. A little sad, but knowing our Glacier days of Argentina were still ahead of us – we relaxed and enjoyed the day indoors. We so enjoyed our few days there and would definitely recommend it! However that Sunday afternoon we said our goodbyes and made our way back to the city of Quito.

We arrived back and starting packing and prepping for the next adventure...Galapagos!

Derek and I were chatting and just saying how lucky we are – every time we happen to leave an amazing place, as sad as it is, we are always so excited to see what awaits us at the next destination.

Medellin, Colombia 21st September

After another night bus we safely got to the city of Medellin. Known for its amazing nightlife...which we were unfortunately not going to get to experience... we got ready for the day’s  jampacked itinerary of sightseeing !

Considering we got going around 9am (having put our bags in storage for the day) we seemed to have whizzed through the list in less than 2 hours! This left us eating lunch at about 11am!

The city does boast an amazing cathedral (we walked in mid-mass and took in the feel of the place); we also got to see these sculptures by a very well-known Colombian called Bottero. There’s a whole plaza dedicated to his work - the sculptures are all fat / blown up versions of humans and animals – really comical actually!

After realising that the airport would take us 2 buses and an hour and a half’s journey, we decided to rather be safe than sorry and make our way there!! Just as well considering airport security second to none! Both Derek and I were body searched twice, 3 bag searches and a sniffer dog! (I wasn’t too happy about the dog slobbering all over my bag!)

Bogota - 18-19 September 2011

We arrived at the main bus terminal in Bogota (the capital of Colombia) and stood in line for a ticket to catch a taxi to our hostel, the Cranky Croc in the La Candelaria suburb of Bogota. The taxi driver was struggling to find the hostel, luckily we had agreed the price upfront, but started getting worried he was just going to drop us off in the middle of nowhere. Bogota is not safe at night and so this concerned us both deeply. Eventually he found the place, thank goodness for that! The Cranky Croc was great, we really enjoyed it there. The beds were nice with clean sheets and big duvets to keep you warm at night. Bogota is actually really cold due to the altitude (2600m above sea level).

The next morning over breakfast we decided to go to Zipaquira where the Salt Cathedral is situated. (an underground salt mine that has been transformed into a Cathedral, where it’s still mined at night) The town of Zipaquira is about 2 hours away from where we were staying, a bit of a hack, but so worth it when we got there! We had an English guide for the tour of the Salt Cathedral, an absolute must if you visit!

John was great, he told us so much interesting information about the Cathedral and how they mine the rock salt now and in the past, it really is quite amazing. They mine tunnels out of the mountain that are 10m wide, 16m high and 100m long, they are massive! South America is very Catholic in faith and many people died in the mines over the years, so they built a temple in the mine to pray for safety and to mourn the death of those who’ve passed away. All the way down into the mine they have created areas that represent the 14 stages of Jesus’ crucifixion. These are all done really well with lighting effects. This all leads down to the cathedral which is huge and amazing. It is also a couple hundred meters underground!

The next day in Bogota we had one of the most fun days of sightseeing we have had on our whole trip so far! We signed up to do the Bogota Bicycle Tour. We rocked up and got some bikes and then waited for our guide to arrive. There were only a Spanish father and daughter and Tess and I on the tour that day. When Mike Ceasar arrived, neither of us thought too much of the guy, he was an oldish American, wearing an old long sleeve jersey, jeans and a floppy wide rimmed hat, riding a rather simple bike with a bag on the side of the front wheel. Never before has the saying “don’t judge a book by its cover” been more appropriate!

Mike moved to Bogota as a journalist and has been living in Bogota for the last 6 years. He was a fountain of knowledge and we could ask him just about anything and he usually had some great story to regale us with for each of the places we visited.

That day with Mike we visited such a diverse set of places, these are some of the highlights; we started with the Simon Bolivar Square where Bogota was founded in 1538!It is a pretty amazing square,with the Courts, Parliament Buildings and a cathedral on one of the sides too.  We then rode away from the La Candelaria district through Graffiti Alley and on to one of the largest fruit markets in Bogota. Mike took us into the market and cut open a whole lot of the exotic fruits for us to try, this was amazing and even Tess had a try of all the weird and wonderful fruits that day, except the avo of course!

Mike then took us for a little ride through the red light district in Bogota, they call this place the high socialisation impact zone! Prostitution is only legal in these zones. We visited a small coffee and cocoa factory and had the best coffee of our trip. Colombia exports most of its coffee and actually imports low quality coffee for local consumption. Colombia exports about 80% of the coffee they produce. From there we went to the cemetery and Mike amused us with stories about a whole bunch of the famous and infamous people that were buried in the cemetery. This was actually pretty interesting even though it may seem a little dull to you guys.

We cycled our way up through the main streets of Bogota and the next place we came to was the bull ring. There is a very short season in Colombia (Jan-Feb). They get matadors out from Spain and so this is the only time they have the fights.

That pretty much concluded the cycle tour. This day was so much longer and so much more fun than we expected it to be. We headed back to our hostel and got ourselves ready to go and catch a bus to Medellin. We asked the hostel to get us a taxi to take us to the bus terminal, when the guy arrived we asked the price, as you should always do, he just pointed to the meter indicating that is what we would get charged. We ended up getting ripped off paying 3 times what we paid when we first arrived. Both of us were SOO irritated by this as we had been cooking meals in and trying to save money to keep to the budget we set and this guy just ruined our day and our end to Bogota!

Villa de Leiva, 17 September 2011

Villa de Leiva is a beautiful little town that reminded Tess and I of Franschoek walking around it: little cobbled streets, white houses and Tuscan style roofs, minus the vineyards unfortunately. Villa de Leiva is also considered a World Heritage site and definitely deserves the title. We really loved Villa de Leiva and wished we could have spent more time there.


We arrived from San Gil on a short bus ride (4hrs) to Tunja and then another 45 mins to the town itself. We left the bus station confident we would find Hostal Rana, situated in Calle 10a 3-30. When we reached Calle 10 (road 10 in Spanish, not very orriginal, but easy to follow for us Gringo's) we couldn't seem to work out the numbering of the houses. We asked the nearest shop owner if she knew where the place was and she kindly gave us some directions. After we reached the main town square we knew that we had gone a little too far, but only to find the shop assistant running after us giving us new directions. Very sweet! We still haven't figure out the house numbering system and even after asking the owner of Hostel Rana she could enlighten us any further.

Once we had checked in we headed out to find ourselves some lunch. To our pleasant surprise we found a lovely Italian restaurant that had a hugely diverse menu, from grilled meat and fish to all kinds of pasta and pizza. Tess for the first time was spoilt for choice on the food side.

After the amazing lunch we wondered around the town for a bit, there was a political rally happening in the evening and there were loads of cars, bakkies and buses making their way to the town square, which is the centrepiece of the town: a huge, magnificent cobbled square that has the cathedral dominating the one side. We opted out of joining the rally and headed back to our hostel instead for a quiet evening.

We got an early start the next morning and headed out to explore the beautiful town some more. We wondered the lovely streets and found ourselves a fresh juice and pastry for breakfast. Fuelled up we wondered up to the top of the town where we had a lovely view over the town and the surrounding areas. It really is a fantastic little town.

Unsure what else there was for us to see, we went past the bus station to buy our tickets to Bogota later that afternoon and then buoyed by the great lunch the previous day we headed to our new favourite restaurant only to find this closed for a private party. Standing outside looking rather confused, a lovely lady asked us if we were looking for a restaurant, we said that we had eaten at this place the previous day and we hoping to do the same again. She then assisted us in recommending another few places around town, so we set out in search of our next great meal. We found one of the places she had recommended, Tess was so pleased with the place she actually had a steak, which was great a great change from her usual; chicken and rice J.

Later that afternoon we headed to catch our bus to Bogota and a rather rude surprise was waiting for us: when we bought our tickets we were told that our bus would be a company that we had seen in a few places and we were comfortable with what to expect, when she showed us the bus that we would be on we were rather worried. Firstly, there was nowhere underneath the bus to put our luggage and so Tess and I each took two seats one for our luggage and one to sit in. This rather cheeky space hogging approach was very short lived and the guy came in demanding if we had paid for four tickets (we obviously hadn’t) so we had to squash up with our big backpacks in front of us for a four hour journey. Now we were pissed off to say the least! We had been sold a lemon! Secondly, the bus door didn’t close properly! Considering we were sitting closest to the door we were concerned that some of our things may fall out!  Thirdly, the décor in the bus was all green with tassels everywhere, like old fashioned curtains from many decades ago, some silver silhouettes of naked ladies that kind of bounced around as we moved and some rather kitsch signs, like “A need for speed” coupled together with weed stickers. We were not overly convinced that this bus was going to get us there safely, on time, or at all for that matter!

We assumed the rubbish bus was going to go via Tunja, a city where we knew the big bus companies went through to Bogota, so for the next 10 mins we figured out how to say in Spanish that we wanted to change buses, get some of our money back and change to a smarter bus in Tunja, this quelled the anger only slightly. This resolution was very short-lived as the bus we were on made a turn away from Tunja, direct to Bogota. So we settled in for the long, uncomfortable, stressful journey. By some small miracle in the end they got us to where we needed to be safely and on time!