Santa Cruz Island
After a long navigation from the western areas of the archipelago, today we arrived at Santa Cruz. The National Geographic Endeavour anchored at Academy Bay, located south of this island.
This morning we had the chance to visit one of the most interesting places of this week: the Charles Darwin Research Station. Founded in 1964, it has proved to be a vital instrument to the survival and viability of various once-endangered species in this archipelago. Amongst these species are the Galápagos giant tortoises and the land iguanas. The Research Station holds several corrals with these creatures.
Along a wooden path, several tortoise corrals are found, including those with baby tortoises bred at this center and the parental population of the endemic Espanola species. But there was one famous tortoise nobody wanted to miss: Lonesome George. George is the last survivor of his island. No more live Pinta tortoises have been found after his discovery back in 1971 so, despite his celebrity, his story remains a sad one.
After learning more about the various fields of research carried out by this center, a visit to the nearby town of Puerto Ayora was due. This is the busiest town in the Galápagos, with a resident human population of around 15,000 people living in it. Many of us enjoyed a stroll along the streets of this picturesque little city, as well as some shopping in its various souvenir shops!
Santa Cruz Island holds different vegetation zones, from the littoral zone, through its arid dry slopes, and its moist uplands. Today’s schedule is a different one, and instead of having lunch on board the National Geographic Endeavour we enjoyed a delicious lunch in a restaurant in the highlands of Santa Cruz, surrounded by beautiful greenery and fresh air. By bus we then set off to explore the highlands.
Many of our guests chose to visit the ‘Gemelos’ first. These are two sink holes found on either side of the road, right in the heart of the Scalesia forest. Scalesia trees belong to an endemic genus found here in the Galápagos, that are related to daisies and sunflowers. Mainly bird species are found in this ‘cloud forest’ area, amongst them small tree and warbler finches, Galápagos doves and Vermillion flycatchers. Afterwards, we headed towards another spot still found in these moist uplands.
Santa Cruz Island holds a large population of these giant tortoise reptiles (4000 approx.), and in this area we can still find many of them rather easily. It was amazing to be able to find these gentle giants enjoying the green, fleshy leaves of various kinds of plants in the open fields, oblivious to our presence. This is a different landscape which seems to be dominated by reptiles only, an almost surreal one, which is certainly a sight that will stay in our memories for a long time.
