We are sailing.......

Its closer than it looks.  Don't look up Frankie.....

One of our best days on the Galapagos was a day sailing trip to Islas Plazas, on the Queen Karen boat.  There were 16 of us, like the island-hopping boats we’d been on, on this occasion mostly French or Canadian.  However unlike previously, this was a proper boat you could get up and walk around on, sit down for lunch, find space to lie in the sun together, and admire the view, whilst looking out for dolphins, rays and flying fish which would jump out of the water every now and again. In fact you could almost reach out and touch the frigate birds that accompanied us, which might have been more obvious if I hadn’t left the wide angle on the lens for this photo!

The boat left from Baltra at around 09:00, sailed around the east coast to Punta Carrion for a snorkel, then continued around to Islas Plazas, where we would stop for a land trip, after which we’d continue round to the south of the island to Puerto Ayora, where we ended the day.

The boys are getting much more accustomed to snorkelling now and it was good to give them some new water entry experiences - on this occasion we had disembarked on to the small Nautilus tender, and once they had their gear on, I encouraged them to just fall backwards, as if we were scuba diving. Louis said he thought for a moment about the double-twisting, triple somersault echo-saltzer with obligatory pike, but then opted just for a straightforward front flop dive.  Visibility was very clear, over 30 metres, the best we’d seen it so far, so really good for the boys to enjoy this.  We stayed broadly in a group, with Kike, our guide pointing out a few fish types along the way like rays and blennies, and stopping to explain these. He picked up a spikey sea urchin and let us feel it creeping along on our hand, a strange sensation.  The boys are now adept at diving down to get a closer look at things, and Frankie at one point must have been more than four metres down.  It surprised me given we hadn’t yet discussed equalising pressure, he later told me he just ignored the fact that his ears started hurting a bit when he went down!  Not surprisingly, when Frankie went down, Louis would often go down and try and match him.

We’d been swimming in the deeper water and then ended in shallower water just a couple of metres deep, in the hope of seeing a shark, since they like to find the warmer water. 
It wasn’t till just after we’d got out that we saw a shark just where we would have been moments later!  Frustrating as we were hoping to give Louis his first shark experience and Frankie a much clearer one than yesterday at Finch Bay.

We had an hour or so in the boat, sailing to Islas Plazas.  In some ways the journey was as good as the destination, the novelty of standing in the front of the boat on a beautiful sunny day, with the wind in your hair, making quite an impression on the boys. They are getting slightly better at putting sun cream on - even after 10 weeks, we are down to about 45 seconds of protesting now.

Some useful advice posted on the trails.....

We hopped onto the tender to make a dry landing at Islas Plazas and KiKe pointed out Gordon’s Rocks in the distance. Jules and I remembered scuba diving there ten years ago when we came before. We discussed it - we couldn’t remember much about the dive, but something about the name had stuck though........

Say "CHEEEESE!"

Kike guided us through a leisurely walk around one of the beautiful, yet arid and hostile islands. Sealions were abundant, keeping very close to the shores, as sharks like to come through and help themselves to seal pups, especially at dawn and dusk when they typically feed.  We learnt lots of good information from Kike and the boys gradually got braver at asking questions.  Frankie has already completed a separate entry on the Frigate Bird, with the Land and Marine Iguanas, both of which we saw here, to follow, and Louis to contribute on the Galapagos Sealion.

After an excellent lunch, we lay out again on the top deck at the front, and enjoyed one of those moments where even as you are experiencing it together, you know you will revisit it many times in the future to try and recapture the feeling of calmness, freedom,and happiness we shared.

This is the life......

Slight reality check towards 4pm as we approached Puerto Ayora and the engine failed. After some delay, we had a trip back in the tender  But the way we saw it, we had an extended stay on the boat at no extra charge!