Galapagos Islands, Santa Cruz – March 2007
The Galapagos Islands are now part of Ecuador, they are a National Park and Marine Reserve. It is not easy to obtain a cruising permit so most yachts stay in one place and use local transport to get about. The currency is the US Dollar although Ecuador coins are used too. The local language is Spanish.
We arrived in Santa Cruz harbour, Galapagos, at lunchtime on 19th March. The anchorage is known not to be too good and bow and stern anchors are advised, however our bow anchor did seem to go in well. We set up a stern anchor before dark. The bay had a number of boats that we recognised, and we launched our dinghy to ask around and find out the local situation. It turns out that there is no dinghy dock and in fact you are not allowed to land your dinghy. Instead there is a good water taxi service at 50c per adult, which listens on VHF channel 14.
The next morning we went ashore to sign in, expecting some possibly hefty charges, nobody in Panama had been sure exactly what would be charged.
In fact the charges for the yacht amounted to 157 USD, and the police charged us 30 USD for immigration in/out. We never did get charged a National Park fee. So the islands were not so expensive to visit as we thought they might be.
Food in the islands is mostly imported, although quite a bit of fruit, veg and dairy farming is done locally. The hotels and seafront restaurants are owned by non-Galapagos companies and so this revenue escapes the islanders, however away from the front there are plenty of local restaurants which are very cheap, typically a local meal costs 2.50 USD and our family can eat for less than 10 USD.
This is more expensive than downtown Panama City was, but is still good for us. Supermarket prices are quite a bit higher than Panama but goods have to be transported nearly 1000 miles to get here so the prices are not unreasonable.
In general we were pleasantly surprised with Santa Cruz as a holiday destination. Because the islands are mostly National Park, tourism is kept low-key and Puerto Ayora, the most populous town of 17,000 inhabitants, is a very pleasant place to be. Often a cool moist breeze blows from the sea and keeps the temperature moderate.
The town has most facilities such as supermarket, internet, laundry, restaurants, taxis, post office, etc. The prices are higher than Panama but are not silly.
The place is full of wildlife although it is not always apparent. From the boat we saw pelicans, sea-lions, rays, boobies, fish, frigatebirds, and various other seabirds. The boobies dive in like a missile from a great height, always a surprise! The sea-lions sunbathe on some of the boats, and the rays swim in shoals around the harbour.
On the island we saw giant tortoises, lizards, a marine iguana, sea-lions and pelicans by the fish market, and various other birds. We took a taxi tour into the hills to see giant tortoises in the wild, we walked through a lava tunnel, and visited Los Gemelos ancient volcanic craters. In our dinghy we visited the island in the bay and swam with sea-lions. And one day we walked to Tortuga beach, about half an hour from the nearest road and within the National Park, it is a long white-sand beach reached by a beautiful paved walk through land covered in cacti and various other low trees, full of small lizards and birdsong. The beach is pristine and untouched, the sand is fine and the waves crash onto the beach – good for surfing but busy for swimming, and sometimes dangerous. We did not go to the far end where there is access to a sheltered beach, because we had the pushchair and the walk was 1km through sand. So we made do where we were and had a lovely time.
We visited the Darwin centre to the east of town to see the giant tortoises in areas based on their age and size. The oldest tortoises are about 150 years old! We also saw different types of iguana in breeding programs.
It is possible to go on tours within Santa Cruz and to other islands, however here costs mount up fast and as a family with a baby we are not up for a lot of hiking etc. So we avoided these.
Before we left we stocked up on food, I did a couple of forays into the town towards the market and found several more small supermarkets and the main fruit and vegetable market. I bought some plastic stackable trays for stowing the fruit as we could not find suitable netting, and I loaded up the pushchair with heaps and heaps of fruit. The journey to the Marquesas takes 3-4 weeks and I don’t want us to go short!
Finally we signed out, tidied the boat and headed off on 1st April.