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Adventure Cruise to the Galapagos IslandsThese Animals are InnocentBy Susan Scott SchmidtTwo albatrosses on the Galapagos Island of Espanola are beginning an elaborate mating dance. Facing each other, the birds sit on a bed of rocks and bow deeply. Then the choreography starts. Beaks up, beaks down, click beaks – clack, clack, clack. They go on for an hour in the broiling Ecuadorean sun on this September day, oblivious to the onlookers. Albatrosses mate for life. And I have come from Pittsburgh to the equator to watch their dance on these strange and inhospitable volcanic islands. My husband and I came on a weeklong cruise on a 20-passenger yacht called the Eric. We set out twice daily to the islands from our ship in small boats called “pangas,” accompanied by a naturalist guide.
Galapagos animals are so tame you can literally trip over them. They have no fear. “They are innocent,” said our guide, Harry Jiminiez. And this hasn’t changed in centuries. In 1535, a Spanish bishop, Tomas de Berlanga, stumbled upon the islands while seafaring from Panama to Peru. He wrote to the King of Spain: “(there are) birds like those from Spain, but so silly they don’t know how to flee and many are caught by hand.” Their lack of fear is disconcerting. Sea lions lounge on the stone docks, blocking the passengers’ entrance to the island. They make no effort to flee. A bluefooted booby chick sits in the middle of a trail, gazing up, while we step over her. A mockingbird in search of water perches on our shoulder and pecks at a water bottle. The islands’ most famous visitor was Charles Darwin, who visited in 1835 on the HMS Beagle. The animals he observed formed the basis for his theory of how species evolve. For him, it was a living laboratory. Galapagos means Spanish “saddle,” which tortoise shells resemble. The islands were formed when lava erupted from the ocean floor 600 miles west of Ecuador, seven to nine million years ago. They were also known as Les Incantadas (bewitched islands), because ocean currents converge there, creating a fog which made the islands seem to disappear. In the 18th century, the isolated islands were a pirates’ refuge, where they hid after attacking Spanish galleons. In the 19th century, Galapagos was a favored stop for whalers, who loaded their ships with tortoises and enjoyed their succulent meat. In 1832, Ecuador finally claimed the islands for its own. No other nation wanted them. Since 1959, the Galapagos has been a national park, with 97 percent of its territory protected. The islands are now the hub of a thriving ecotourism industry. On our tour, we crisscrossed the sea, island hopping by day and sailing by night. Every island is different. They range from black volcanic rock to lush greenery. This is adventure travel. Neither easy nor convenient. No visitors’ centers greet us with automated exhibits. There are no cars, glossy brochures, toilets, signage, trash cans or paved walkways – save for the four inhabited islands, which have villages. Some don’t even have a dock. In a “wet landing,” our boat pulled up on the beach and we waded in, barefooted. Some have a primitive stone dock or an occasional handrail. It’s just us, face to face with nature. To get there, we flew to Guyaquil, the Ecuadorean port city, and took a daily flight to the islands, where we boarded the yacht. Total time in the air from Pittsburgh: nine hours. We overnighted in Guyaquil at the Oro Verde Hotel, a five-star hotel whose staff fetched us at the airport in a Mercedes mini-van. They greeted us at the hotel with peppermint-scented face towels and fresh mango juice. Our tour included daily island hikes with a guide, deep water snorkeling, meals and nightly briefings. We took two trips a day to explore an island, accompanied by our guide in the panga. Our group included a Florida biologist, a San Antonio teacher, a honeymoon couple from the San Francisco Bay, a California banker, a Seattle engineer and his wife, three writers and two travel agents. There are nine crew members t cater to 14 guests. It was the “garua” or mist season in September, so some days are cloudy with a fine mist blowing in. The boat rocked violently at night – seas are rough in the early fall – and some passengers look green. Everyone was wearing a Dramamine patch or taking medicine. We ate well on the Eric. Every lunch and dinner started with fresh Ecuadorean soup. The cuisine makes heavy use of local ingredients – shrimp, rice, cilantro, eggs, potato cakes with cheese, avocado and cucumber salads. On our return to the ship after our island forays, we are met by our taciturn waiter, Hugo, wearing black tie and holding a tray of hors d’oeuvres. The islands can be desolate. “This looks like hell,” breathed by husband as we disembarked on the first day. We began our visit on Genovese Island (Tower), home of the nacza booby bird. Sea turtles are swimming in the water. We navigated up Prince Phillip’s steps, a treacherous stone staircase (so named because the Duke of Edinborough took a pratfall on them). We are covered with sunscreen and hauling bottles of fresh water. The boobies are sitting on nests of two eggs each. But they are genetically engineered to raise only one each. “The second egg is insurance,” says our guide. IF two eggs do hatch, the older sibling will devour the younger. Booby chicks look like masses of white cotton fluff. Years ago, scientists were intrigued by the question: why doesn’t a booby raise two chicks? They added a second live chick to the nest, as an experiment. Exhausted from the food demands of the two chicks, the booby parents, who regurgitate fish oil to feed the young, expired from exhaustion. “One scientist can do more damage than a thousand tourists,” says Jiminez, rolling his eyes. Today the islands are tightly controlled by the park service. They are charged with protecting the animals and patrolling the islands. On the islands, the ecosystem is fragile. You cannot take anything out or bring anything in. A Kleenex blows out of my hand and I panic, chasing it over the terrain. The major threat to endemic species are non-native species introduced by man, which can take over. Feral pigs and rats are being eradicated by the Park Service, because they eat tortoise eggs. Snorkeling in deep water takes several afternoons. Our group members aw purple octopus, sea turtles, sharks and parrotfish. One day is devoted to bluefooted boobies on the island of North Seymour. A clump of land iguanas smiles eerily for the camera. Iguanas sleep in burrows and subsist on flowers, fruit and prickly pear cactus. A marine iguana, black and slick, spits salt water out of its nose. The booby birds’ feet are a surreal shade of blue. To cordon off their nesting area, the boobies shoot out a stream of guano to encircle the nest. On North Seymour, I saw the most spectacular sight of the week – a frigatebird with its pouch exposed. Its gulac sack looks like a red balloon under the bird’s neck.. During the mating season, the male frigate inflates its pouch and exposes it to the female in hopes of pairing off. We surprised a cluster of frigates, with 20 red balloons inflated and wings spread, showing off. The next day we disembarked on Bartholemew Island, to see rock formations and Galapagos penguins. As a small concession to tourists, the island has built a wooden railing to hold onto while climbing to the top of a steep stone staircase.
(The exhibits are good and there is a small gift shop there.) Two celebrity tortoises live here. One is Lonesome George, the last of his species, who used to live on Pinta. George has no mate. The Park Service offers a $10,000 reward if anyone can find a female of his type. The second hero is Diego, who was shipped in from the San Diego Zoo years ago and repopulated an island, singlehandedly mating up a storm with the females. The tortoises are all vegetarian and we were within inches, watching them munch their leaves. The face of E.T., the movie character, was fashioned after the tortoises. In earlier days, before they became a protected species, islanders would keep them as pets. Also on Santa Cruz, we traveled to the private Primicious Tortoise Farm onin a ramshackle bus going over dirt roads to the highlands. Here tortoises roam in hatural habitat, bathing in mud or mating among coffee trees and banana plants. The dot the farm’s fields. Admission is $3. On the last day of our tour, we climbed over boulders on Espagnola Island to see Christmas iguanas in shades of red and green. Huge lava lizards scatter as we approach. We saw the placenta of a newborn sea lion pup on the beach. And, finally, we re fortunate enough to observe the albatross mating dance. And, off the bow of the boat, a school of dolphins suddenly appeared. This is the oddest collection of creatures. Which brings me back to the strange, wonderful and unexpected nature of the Galapagos Islands. Anything can happen here. As Herman Melville said in the nineteenth century: “No spot on earth can in desolateness furnish a parallel to this group.” If You’re Going:Fly to Miami and pick up an American Airlines flight to Guyaquil or Quito, Ecuador. (Guyaquil is easier if you suffer from altitude adjustment problems.) Fly to Galapagos on Aerogal Airlines. Pack good walking shoes, seasickness medication, two bathing suits, sunblock and a broadbrimmed hat. Dress is casual – shorts and chinos. Hotel Oro Verde, Guyaquil, Ecuador Galapagos Network (which operates the Eric Cruise) Photographs by Thomas M. Schmidt |
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TM
On these hunks of volcanic rock just east of Ecuador,
the albatross is one of the odd species which have evolved to adapt to the
environment. They will greet me all week – bluefooted boobies, iguanas, sea
lions, lava lizards, and the prehistoric Galapagos giant tortoise.
On Santiago Island, we finally saw the giant tortoises.
There are only 15,000 to 20,000 of these tortoises left today on the
islands. Whalers wiped them out in the early days by eating the meat and
selling their oils. Today, feral species threaten their eggs. The Darwin
Research Center on Santa Cruz Island, trying to keep pace, harvests tortoise
eggs an incubates them, raising the hatchlings in captivity until the age of
five or six.