Galapagos Intro

Oh and I forgot to mention that at the last unmentionable hostel the shower electrocuted you when you touched the extremities, and the walls were literally being broken down around us! We came back to a pile of rubble up to our shins, directly pressed onto our door. Of concrete! Lmao the dustpan was clearly not doing the job . ;). Thank God we had plans to move on. .......

.....on a MUCH more positive note........I also forgot to mention the funny t-shirts we encountered at the Macchu Picchu base town of Aguas Caliente. One was Cuys and Roses. Cuy means Guinea Pig in Spanish. (Some , ummmm interesting and totally disturbing menu pictures is all I will say on that topic)it was a shirt with the Guns and Roses logo with Guinea Pigs playing in an 80's rock band. Amazing! And the second was the Peruvian Crooks and Castles gangster wear. It was called Criminales and Casa's . Haha beyond amaaaazing!

After a couple days at Santa Cruz, Galapagos. I decided to go on a 2 day tour to San Cristobal. The taxi's are mediocre priced. Reasonable I guess compared to COMPLETELY unreasonable  things that have been encountered. Hah the iPod is barely functioning on a skipped beat that switches songs everytime you get psyched for one. Maybe every couple seconds ,....maximum a minute. Better than no music. It heals the soul I find, even in sped up mood changes,.....( no comment ) lol the speedboat can vary. I rode the top to and from San Cristobal. The way there from Santa Cruz was about 2 1/2 hours. And was VERY bumpy. Luckily I was at the pier at 6:15 and had no time for breakfast. This gave me the up and up drastically. On top of the fact that I rode the top of the boat with the Captain. :) I just fumbled into this luxury by fluke, and it gave me insight into the only way to not get sick and get the absolute most out of your water taxi through the Pacific Galapagos inner islands. But beware. Depending on the specific boat, there may be no top at all, or there may be a rickety one which is 'life jacket recommended'. I could compare it to a popcorn kernal on a roller coaster. My muscles were very pulled from all angles just focussing on not flying off the boat or fracturing my tailbone on the crash landing from top of the  swell/s. And to be honest,....it was amazing!!! Much better than the extreme dune buggying. Wouldn't have had it any other way. No time for your mind and body to focus on being sick. Lol some swells are terrifying. Sometimes you think the boat is gonna tip over. But the thrill of the top of the speedboat is better than being nauseated with a large group of strangers, for 3 hours anyday. 

We  passed Isla Santa Fe on the way . I thought there may be hope for a rest or lunch or a anything but perma-thrashing. There was not . Lol but beautiful nonetheless . When we arrived in San Cristobal the sun was shining. The weather was sweet. And we went straight to a Sea lion refuge. The tour began with La Loberia. An amazing beach filled with breeding marine iguanas to start. They were trying to gain territory and mates, so I saw quite the fight happen between alpha males. They nod their heads as a sign of territorial, mating showmanship. They are much more colourful on San Cristobal. It's weird because the blood all over the rocks from the losing competitor was bright bright red. Like paint. Or graffiti. I am not sure if it has to do with the chemical element of the temperature of a reptiles blood in the warm air or what, but it was something to see. From there we continued on to where the sea lions breed in colonies. There is approximately one male for 30 females. So to see him doing his rounds at certain times is not only threatening but also amazing. You can't get suuuuper close to him out of fear of the unknown, but the mothers and grown pups are much less territorial. Aaaaand did I mention the babieszzzz?????!!!!  Paaahhhhh OH- MY-GOD are they ever cuuuute. It's almost too intense how cute they are. Juuuust so overwhelming. They look into your eyes with their big beautiful eyes. Like clumsy baby puppies with fins!  They play and bark and crawl over each other and swim with sea turtles. Wow . Just wow. You just want to hold them and cuddle them , but Ma's and Pa clearly wouldn't like that. So you keep the distance for safety. (Shhhhhh I pet ones little insanely adorable head, he was breathtaking,....not the Seinfeld kind)   . I got to swim with them and giant sea turtles too. Finalllyyyyyy. 

It was unreaaalllll. I was in awe all day. Especially when we went to the next beach. Where the sea lion pups were in a big cuddle puddle. Yeah, I just used that term.  It was Playa Punta Carola. Which is just up the path behind the wall from Playa Mann.