It all started with waking up to my alarm clock after I snoozed twice, brushing my teeth, packing my day bag and walking out onto the streets. After I had a delicious submarine sandwich for breakfast. Absolutely amazing start to the day. Couldn't have asked for anything better.
In all seriousness, it started getting pretty good as I got my pre-dive briefing at the dive shop. My divemaster explained the routes perfectly and got me quite excited while listing off all the potential animals we could see today. As there were only two divers that day, we were put on a boat filled with snorkelers and off we went. A quiet boat ride later and we arrived at a beach close to the dive site for a quick tour. I had no idea we'd be doing this so it was a bit of an extra bonus, albeit a somewhat boring bonus. A single marine iguanas simply doesn't have the same wow facter after 10 days of seeing hoards of them.
Dive One
Roughly an hour later we arrived at Kicker Rock, our dive site for the day. It's this incredible rock formation off the coast of Isla Isabella with a channel splitting through the right side with perfect vertical walls plunging as far as 18m. Our first dive was straight through the channel and around the right. We dropped in and the first thing I noticed was how extremely blue the water was. Three marine currents make up the contents of the ocean water in the Galapagos and the greenish plankton filled Humboltd current is weaker in this season, leaving conditions crystal clear and crazy blue waters at this site. As we hit the bottom below I was quite impressed with the corals, sponges and starfish clinging to the walls. None of the other sites I dived at had this sort of variety of life and vegetarion. We even spotted an octopus hiding in a hole in the wall with a rock shelf covering himself. Almost immediately we spotted about 5 nudibranches on a rock, a type of slug about 1cm long that's brilliant blue with small coral like branches coming off its back. We swam north against the current, with a few hundred fish doing the same thing. Swimming the same path as everything else is awesome, you feel like you're apart of the ecosystem and not just intruding in it. At the end of the channel and the start of the bend we encountered a ton of turtles, black tipped sharks and a few barracudas roaming around. Sweeping around 360 degrees I watched four sharks float around us with one coming in for a closer look! At our 5m safety stop we found two sleeping turtles. However they were actually clinging upside down to the rock on an overhang, like underwater bats and we ended up waking them up as we got closer. Which is when one of them groggily approached me and came inches away from my face before turning away. Obviously I caught up to it and we had quite the intimate swim sesh.
 |
| Kicker Rock, Isla Isabella |
Dive Two
Dropping in on the far left we slowly worked our way down and towards a rocky corner of Kicker to hang on for dear life waiting for Hammerheads as the current here was strong. We spotted one in the distance going away from us and hoped it would come back. In the meanwhile we saw a ball of angel fish feeding, an angry looking moray eel, another hiding octopus as well as a Galapagos Shark swimming next to a turtle as if they were good friends. Then it happened, two or three meters in front of us a huge hammerhead appeared from the distance and made a slow arc as if deliberately showing off to us. Moments later a male sea lion dropped in to feed, scattering fish left and right as the hunt begun. Watching a meter above the rock the sea lion stopped right below me, paused to take a look up at me and then dove deeper in search of food. Leaving the rock to go to the backside we didn't see too much, just a few turtles and black tip chasing a school of sardines. Approaching the backside I noticed a huge black shadow in the distance with gleams of silver every so often. Getting closer I realized it was a HUGE bait ball of Salimas? We slowly swam straight into the middle of it. Slowly getting engulfed by fish mere inches from your entire body is a new experience. 360 around were hundreds and hundreds of fish. Looking down, fish. Above, fish. Totally surrounded by fish, it was quite dark there except for a few rays of sunshine piercing through the top and bouncing off the silver sides of the fish. Absolutely unreal diving. I was somewhat "disappointed" by my first dives in the islands as they didn't reach my lofty expectations, but this was quite the satisfying wet dream.
 |
| As if I know what I am actually doing underwater |
Runways and Sea Lions
Afterwards, meeting up with a few friends I had made earlier in the week from a diving trip we set off to buy some groceries for the night as I was cooking. Fresh tuna apparently is harder to find on the islands than you would think even though they're quite abundant in the waters. Nonetheless, we managed to find a decent grouper and the ball kept rolling from there. We all split off at this point and I ran off to Loberia, a beach about 30 minutes from town filled with sea lions. Next to the path to the beach is this crazy open pit mine with a ton of litter and garbage around it.. Absolutelt shocking. Seriously of all places humans have savaged, must we destroy the Galapagos too? Beach. Filled with adult sea lions and pups alike on the beach, I was quite happy to shoot a few snaps while getting quite enchanted with one pup before heading back. But the real gem of the trip was seeing a path that led straight to the airport's runway.. While there was a fence that covered half the path, doing little more than attracting my attention, there was also a sign but it was in spanish and I obviously could play the gringo card in a tight situation and decided to I press on. It was around twilight and I was standing in the middle of an airport runway.. In the Galapagos.. That was pretty sick, and I have the pictures to prove it.
 |
| Airport Runway, Isla Isabella |
Ceviche and Climbing
Meeting up with the three girls again we got back to one of their homestay's place that's sort of like a hostel for volunteers and students. These three girls are apart of a Marine Science exchange program in the Galapagos, 1 month on the mainland, 3 months in the islands and one hell of an epic adventure. Also their program consists of 48 woman and 5 men, 3 who are gay.. But that doesn't matter right? Right back to ceviche. This was one of the first chances I've had to cook for myself in quite a while and it felt fantastic to get back into it. Filleting a fish with a pocketknife however was pretty cowboyish, lacking a proper knife though you make do with whatcha got. Simple ingredients with a little love and a lot of salt always leads to a delicious meal. After a bastardized south american ceviche, a few glasses of wine and one epic Galapagos video in the making, we all called it a night. Walking two of the girls back across town I started my way back to my own place, only to find the door barred and locked. Looking up I realized I could climb up into the secound floor if I used the balcony of the restaurant next door. After breaking into my own hotel around midnight, I promptly realized that this, this was a bloody good day.
 |
| Baby Sea Lion at Loberia |
I'm now in Baños, Ecuador. Adventure capital of the country, surrounded with rivers, canyons, volcanoes and La Casa de Arbol. It's really no surprise why backpackers from all over come to raft, rock climb, rappel into waterfalls and all other sorts of adrenaline activities. Personally I plan to get a least a day or two of climbing in. It's been far too long away from it and there's no better place to jump right back in. Also my muscles are quite soft from lack of hard use, my fault really but time to get back into it. Tired of feeling plump.
Channy
Instagram - itsnathanchan
November 16th, Los Pinos Hostel, Baños, Ecuador
No comments:
Post a Comment