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Leaving for Marquesas

 It´s finally time for the puddle jump! We intend to leave for Hiva Oa, Marquesas early this afternoon. It should be a 2-3 week trip depending on the wind, so posts will be less frequent during this time, though we will try to email some in via SSB radio. In preparation, we made some last minute produce and beer runs yesterday afternoon, and scrubbed all the muck off the hulls this morning to make sure we go as fast as we possibly can. In the process, we had some highs and lows: We located the ONLY canned beer on Isla Isabela, after being told by the grocers that it is…

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PINGÜINOS! And Some Other Coastal Stuff.

 UPDATE: We got great closeups of penguins at the Túneles tour this afternoon, so I’m over my gripe now. Also saw seahorses. Here are the pics. I am so excited to see penguins in Isabela. Unfortunately the authorities here have proven very protective of rides to where they live, and we’re limited on our photo access. Even though our dinghy swings in the direction of the penguins’ rocks daily on it’s way to the town dock, if the authorities so much as see you slow down, you are slapped with a firm finger-wagging and warnings of repercussions from the capitanía. This would be fine with me if their behavior reflected…

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Lucky Shots

 It’s been a good trip for photography for us. Neither of us has a very specialized camera, so we’ve been limited with what we can capture, but we’ve made the best of the versatility our cameras have provided (good macro capabilities, limited manual settings, underwater capability), and we’ve done pretty well. I haven’t had much time for processing or retouching, but I played with a couple lucky shots last night. Now that we’ve joined Frank and Karen, we are lucky enough to have proximity to a long lens, and we are getting access to some great wildlife closeups that we wouldn’t have otherwise. All the credit on those goes to…

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Finally! Galapagos Diving as Advertised

 With reports of better visibility, we each plunked down another $120 for one more shot at the famed Galapagos diving we have heard so much about. Tuesday April 20th at 8:30am, the Isabella Dive Center dive boat picked us up right from Tahina, and we headed over to Isla Tortuga, a large atoll-shaped island that is made of compressed volcanic ash. On the way to Isla Tortuga the captain spotted a manta ray and veered over for a closer look. The manta was at least 6′ across, maybe bigger. It was swimming close enough to the surface that its wing tips would come out of the water. The morning light…

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To Isla Isabela

 We’re off to Galapagos’ largest island, and the least populated of our trip, first thing in the morning. Rumor has it internet there is slim to nonexistent, so minus our regular text updates to the blog via SSB radio, you may miss the photo/video activity on here for a bit. If we fail to find internet on Isabela, then wish us luck, and we’ll post photos once we reach French Polynesia, which should be about 3.5 weeks from now.

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Unlikely Dinner Guests

 After spending the day getting to know the finer details of souvenir shops in Santa Cruz, we moved on to dinner…namely happy hour at The Rock restaurant on Charles Darwin Ave. We found Karen and Frank there after their excursion to the Charles Darwin Center, and while I ran to do a little research on the restaurant’s fine musical selection (Buena Vista Social Club), I was stopped by a man, who commented on the quality of the music, and we struck up a conversation. Turns out the man was W. Bruce Strickrott, pilot of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute’s HOV Alvin. Naturally I was shocked, but he’s a pretty cool guy,…

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Cliff Jumping at Las Grietas

 We had some time yesterday afternoon to make the trek to Las Grietas, a fissure in the rocks where fresh water makes its way out to sea and mixes with salt from the nearby salt flats and the seawater as it intrudes, making it very buoyant. The weather was highly overcast and the sky was bright white, with very dark volcanic rock, so our camera had a hard time handling the contrast, so the photos aren’t great, but we had a great time. Frank, Jason and I scaled the rock faces and jumped into the 30m deep watery canyon below. It rained most of the time we were there, and…

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Wildlife Videos!

 We uploaded two videos to YouTube today. They’re totally unedited, but kinda cool nonetheless. Video 1 is tortoises in San Cristobal and video 2 is seal lions off Santa Cruz. Today we’re wandering about Puerto Ayora and prepping for departure to Isla Isabela tomorrow. Souvenirs, last cravings on food, etc are to be bought here.

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Sightseeing in Galápagos

 Since we arrived in Galápagos, we’ve had the time to do two excursions around the islands, one land-based and one in the water. We hope to do many more while here, but the boat is demanding a little attention at the moment, so today will be reserved for fixing the impeller on the generator, fixing the starboard water pump, doing laundry, and picking up final provisions for the Pacific crossing. We’re also hoping to make it to the Charles Darwin Research Station on Santa Cruz and visit Las Grietas, a lava fissure that has formed some interesting geography and a swimming hole sometime tomorrow. The land-based tour was a few…

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In Puerto Ayora

 After a splendid taxi tour of the island of San Cristobal and a thwarted dive trip due to low visibility, we decided to move on to Santa Cruz for provisioning in Puerto Ayora and another go at diving with the sharks. We leave for the dive tomorrow at 7:20 a.m.

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