Puerto Villamil, Ecuador, South America

I had a great first day on Isabela, but it was absolutely exhausting! I didn’t sleep very well last night, like I maybe got two hours of sleep in total, so I was up well before my 6:20am alarm went off. I met the guys at their hotel at 7:15am, and was lucky enough to get on the same volcano tour that came to pick them up. It was $30 for the tour that included the 45 minute ride to the base of the volcano, the english guide, and lunch. It was well worth it!

Our guide, Tamara, spoke excellent English, and made it a pretty interesting tour. She told us about how the Galapagos Islands were formed, how the Sierra Negra Volcano measured up against other volcanoes in the world, and about some of the wildlife that we saw on the walk. We were a group of seven tourists, but it was mostly John, Harry and me walking ahead of everyone else who tended to be plodding along fairly slowly. We came up with one pact between the three of us that when we get back to our homes, we have to go out one day and have our favorite breakfast, lunch, and dinner meals all in the one day. I chose an American breakfast of pancakes, american bacon, scrambled eggs, and hash browns. For lunch I will have a Thanksgiving wrap from the Main St Grill in Connecticut, and for dinner I’m going to have my Memere’s Pate Chinois (cottage pie). I am already REALLY excited about holding up my end of this pact!

The walk ended up being absolutely stunning, especially compared to what it looked like when we first started. When we got to the base of the volcano it was really overcast, and we were actually walking through the clouds to ascend, so it was pretty chilly and wet. Within about a half hour it started to clear up, and when we reached the top of the caldera, it was beautiful. The sun was burning through the clouds, and we could finally see down into the caldera. It was absolutely stunning. The landscape here is really breathtaking, which surprises me. I wasn’t expecting to see much in the way of scenery, but just a lot of wildlife. I’ve been pleasantly surprised.

We walked up for a total of two hours, and then stopped for a small lunch. We got a sandwich, juice box, apple and a cookie, but it was enough to recharge the batteries and continue on our walk. We got to a point where we could see the north side of Isabela Island, and also see Fernandina Island to the west. It was really nice.

On the way back to the van, the three of us smashed the walk and got back about 10 minutes before the rest of the group arrived. It was a great day, but absolutely exhausting. We got back into town, grabbed lunch, and then split up for a bit. I wanted to come back and take a nap, but I wasn’t able to fall asleep, even though I was so tired. I ended up going out to organize my diving trip, and they aren’t going diving tomorrow, but they definitely have a trip planned for Thursday, so I’m going then.

I met up with John and Harry, and have booked onto another tour with them tomorrow. We are going to go snorkeling at a place called Los Tuneles, and we are hopefully going to see lots of sharks. Fingers crossed! We also met up with a couple of Aussie girls who the guys knew from earlier on in their trip, so we all grabbed dinner in town and had a chat. Laura and Alyce seem really nice, and Laura might be joining me for the dive on Thursday. That would be cool, because otherwise I might end up being the only english speaking person on the tour, and that makes for a very quiet trip.