Commodore
February 15, 2023

Wednesday 15 February – Arc tour to the interior

Another night of constant visitations from the Sea Lions! We had to get up promptly for our highlands tour, meeting the bus at 8am. It always is a bit hit and miss with hailing the water taxis, so we had to leave in good time.

It was a very good tour up to the middle of the island, passing through the different layers of vegetation, a lot of invasive plants that they are trying to get under control. We hiked up to a fresh water crater lake and had some lovely views. We looked down to the side of the island which has a few farms, the island’s population is virtually self sufficient in producing its own fresh produce. There were loads of frigate birds swooping into the lake just touching the water with their beaks, they cant get their feathers wet, which is why they don’t dive into the water, they scavenge off other birds.

Next was the tortoise sanctuary where they have a breeding program. It was blisteringly hot and on the arid side of the mountain. The Galapagos tortoise grows to an enormous size and lives on average to about 150 years old.

We then drove to a lovely beach where we were fed empanadas and bananas for lunch. We had a very refreshing swim, very welcome after our hot trip to the tortoise sanctuary.

In the evening we had a very good burger at the Post Office restaurant, after we managed to get a table on the other side of the building to their live band!