1-26-20 - Welcome to Galapagos Islands!
/Up early. Again. We have to leave for the airport for a flight from Guayaquil to Galapagos Islands by 7:30 am. Leanne isn’t complaining…yet she is. We could use just one easy morning but it’s been a few weeks straight of go-go-go. So off to the airport we go.
The 2.5 hour flight will take us to tiny island of Balta one of only three entry points into the Galapagos. We check in and head to the gate for our flight. As we are sitting there, the loudspeaker announces that passenger Kyle Huebner needs to come to the gate desk. Leanne looks at Kyle and he says, “yeah, I know, they’re probably trying to throw me off the flight,” referencing Leanne’s comment when Ashlynn get called up on the last flight.
They tell Kyle that he needs to follow the attendant but Kyle can’t understand the reason why since the said it in fast Spanish. Kyle follows the guy over the elevator and down to the ground floor. They exit the building and Kyle finds himself on the airport tarmac. The guy starts walking and Kyle is still following. Airplanes are rolling by not more than 25 meters away. After 10 minutes of walking, Kyle is getting worried and thinking maybe the attendant is an imposter and going to lock me up in an airport storage container and demand a huge ransom from Leanne.
They finally enter a building and Kyle finds himself in the guts of the airport operations. There are machines, conveyor belts, trucks, you name it. The guy leads Kyle into a back room and there are las policias standing there unsmiling. There are three bags sitting in the room and sure enough one of them is our blue beast bag. The police demand Kyle’s passport and he’s starting to sweat as he frantically racks his brain trying to think of what is in the bag that could problematic.
They make Kyle take the bag, lay it on a table and open it. This bag contains all the common stuff for the family — detergent, first aid, medications, suntan lotion, insect repellant, mini-scale, games, etc. It’s like our Walmart on wheels. The bag is fairly well organized but it results in about 15 packing cubes of varying sizes. The police start taking every single one out and dumping out its contents. With everyone, they ask “do you have food? Do you have drinks? Do you have plants? Do you have flowers? Do you have insects? Etc etc etc”. It goes on and on and on and on. Finally when he has dumped out the last packing cube and gone through it, he shrugs and says Kyle can go. Kyle has to frantically repack the entire beast and it’s getting closer and closer to the plane’s departure time.
At first, he had no clue what they are searching for but figures it out based on the questions and the fact that Galápagos maintains very strict biodiversity restrictions to protect its environment which has a lot of endemic species from foreign bacteria and the likes. After 20 mins of a thorough luggage probe, they walk Kyle out as unceremoniously as he was escorted in. He still doesn’t know what flagged our bag for the impromptu inspection and never will.
Upon landing, we enter baggage claim and all our bags are brought out and manually placed on the conveyor belt while we wait with the other passengers in a restricted area. When all the bags have been laid out, three policers enter each one with a large German Shephard police dog. They release the hounds and the dogs immediately go to the bags, jump up and start sniffing away.
No joke, we stood there for twenty minutes while each dog sniffed each and every bag over and over. No, they were not looking for the drug lord smuggling in a boatload of cocaine but for the ever more mischievous plant and fruit smuggler trying to sneak in a non-indigenous species that would wreak havoc on millions of years of evolution.
Once we’ve cleared customs with our bags, as much as we would just love to take a travel recovery nap, there’s no having it. From the airport, we take a bus to a small port. From there, we take a boat across to the Island of Santa Cruz. From there, we are picked up by a driver the tour company has arranged and driven to Rancho Primicias which is located on the north top of the island. It is a humid tropical forest with a varied landscape. Its major attraction is seeing the giant tortoises that migrate from the park to this property. The Ranch is a private farm and restaurant where the giant tortoises migrate some 2,000 kilometers for its freshwater source and stay here for a several months each year.
It’s pouring rain but adventure calls and at least it’s warm unlike Machu Picchu. After probably the best chicken lunch EVER, we grab our black rubber boots and head out. Our guide is Stefan who is 25 years old, was born & raised in Santa Cruz and has been a tour guide for three years. He learned English watching Youtube videos.
Wow, bam, we have just been here an hour and we are already tracking through the lush green fields finding these gigantic turtles that live 150 – 180 years. These turtles are ginormous. We even squeeze into an actual turtle shell that is now a relic used for educational purposes and Instagram photos.
Our next stop is the lava tunnels, a structure more than a million years old, that was made when a volcano erupted and the hot molten lava flowed through burning and melting everything in its path. This lava tunnel actually looks man made with its perfectly curved shape. We walk through 400 meters to a crawl space where Ashley, Ashlynn and Kyle get down on the ground and wiggle under the wall for another adventurous 100 meters to the end, unleashing their inner-Indiana Jones.
Next up we head to Los Gamelos or The twins. Two natural sink holes the size of a football field where the land looks like it just free-fell down. The perfect crater was the shape of a salad bowl and full of an omnipresent mist in this part of the Island.
Our guide Stephan shares he must get us to the dive shop for equipment sizing now. We arrive but we miss the time they close for siesta so we just go straight to the hotel.
It’s late afternoon and we are hit with the tragic news of Kobe Bryant’s helicopter crash. Heartbreaking to us as parents, guardians, Lakers fans and one’s who have tragically and unexpectedly lost cherished people in our lives. Kobe was someone very special especially in Los Angeles and it felt like hearing of a dear friend’s passing. That’s the thing with celebrities. We feel we know them. The fact that his daughter was with him makes it all the more tragic. Our thoughts and prayers are with all the victims of the crash and their families.
Leanne grabs her necklace “Carpe Diem” along with her Hope Ring and Cornerstone bracelet. She’s been wearing these items every day on the trip. She prays. Keeping God close and asking him always for strength and protection. May Kobe and his daughter and the others who perished Rest In Peace.
It’s a reminder to keep those you love as close as possible.
