Galápagos

I’ve been three times to the Galápagos Islands, in 2006, 2008 and 2010–each time in July, for a total of four weeks.  Arthur Morris (of Birds as Art) led each trip, with the local guide Juan Salcedo as excellent support.  We went to essentially all the important islands, especially on the last trip, lasting two weeks. The islands belong to Ecuador, which operates them as a National Park, and access is carefully controlled. They are on the equator, about 150 miles across and 600 miles west of the coast; access is by air. As do most groups, we lived on a small boat–ca. 15 clients/leaders and 8-9 crew. All meals were on board;  we went ashore around sunrise (always at ca. 6 a.m.), usually till mid-morning.  We returned ashore in the afternoon, until around sunset. This sometimes alternated with panga (dinghy) rides at places where landing was not feasible.  The captions specify the island where each image was captured, often with additional information.  I hope you will be tempted to go–it’s a marvelous experience!