Santa Cruz
Our visit to the Charles Darwin Research Station was wonderfully relaxed this week. The tortoises were active, clambering over each other and almost over some of us. We started our trek across the town of Puerto Ayora. I visited one of the few shops along the coast that wasn’t selling t-shirts. Although it was centrally located, it was dusty, rather run down, and seemed forgotten. Here they sold goods and items that only a pioneer to a desert island might be interested in. Upon asking the lady who ran the shop when it had been built, she began to tell me her part in the history of the town. They’d bought the land in the late 1950’s when it was entirely surrounded by mangroves. “There was nothing else around” she said.
Today, Puerto Ayora is a buzzing metropolis with a population of around 10,000. When this shop was built, the population was around three hundred, and most of them were pioneers. We live in an ever-changing world. Some places see more changes than others, but to be the only shop in a mangrove swamp one day, and then surrounded by buildings along a major road the next, is hard to imagine. “This shop will remain like this until I die!” said the woman. Only in Puerto Ayora can this happen and that’s what makes it so wonderful!
After our quaint lunch at Altair Restaurant in the highlands, we followed the pleasant weather to the wild tortoises and ‘Gemelos’ pit craters. The tortoises were in abundance in this magical setting, grazing in large numbers. We noticed small white streaks dripping from the top of these giants, as if someone has spilled a small pot of paint over them. These marks are from the large variety of birds that make these high ‘grounds’ their perch. It’s a good place for vermilion flycatchers and cattle egret to hunt for insects. Galápagos hawks seem to just enjoy the ride. In the photo we see a yellow warbler in temporary respite next to one of the giant reptiles.
Our visit to the Charles Darwin Research Station was wonderfully relaxed this week. The tortoises were active, clambering over each other and almost over some of us. We started our trek across the town of Puerto Ayora. I visited one of the few shops along the coast that wasn’t selling t-shirts. Although it was centrally located, it was dusty, rather run down, and seemed forgotten. Here they sold goods and items that only a pioneer to a desert island might be interested in. Upon asking the lady who ran the shop when it had been built, she began to tell me her part in the history of the town. They’d bought the land in the late 1950’s when it was entirely surrounded by mangroves. “There was nothing else around” she said.
Today, Puerto Ayora is a buzzing metropolis with a population of around 10,000. When this shop was built, the population was around three hundred, and most of them were pioneers. We live in an ever-changing world. Some places see more changes than others, but to be the only shop in a mangrove swamp one day, and then surrounded by buildings along a major road the next, is hard to imagine. “This shop will remain like this until I die!” said the woman. Only in Puerto Ayora can this happen and that’s what makes it so wonderful!
After our quaint lunch at Altair Restaurant in the highlands, we followed the pleasant weather to the wild tortoises and ‘Gemelos’ pit craters. The tortoises were in abundance in this magical setting, grazing in large numbers. We noticed small white streaks dripping from the top of these giants, as if someone has spilled a small pot of paint over them. These marks are from the large variety of birds that make these high ‘grounds’ their perch. It’s a good place for vermilion flycatchers and cattle egret to hunt for insects. Galápagos hawks seem to just enjoy the ride. In the photo we see a yellow warbler in temporary respite next to one of the giant reptiles.
