Iguanas, sea lions, and boobies, OH MY!

A post from Tina Shantz

Island Hopping – Part One: Santa Cruz 

So back on October 28^th we turned in our summer papers, presented our class presentations and turned in our research papers all by 12pm. Then it was time for a much needed vacation!! At 1:30pm everyone piled onto two boats to head to Santa Cruz.

Shot of GAIAS as we headed away from San Cristobal!

Unfortunately the water was quite rough and the boat was overcrowded. They had to pull down the tarp covering meaning it was quite hot leading many of us to feel pretty queasy (and a couple to even get sick) on the 1.5hr ride over. However, we got to Santa Cruz and the sun came out! Beautiful!

Santa Cruz is the most populated island which was immediately apparent by the abundance of tourist shops and variety of restaurants (there’s even MULTIPLE pizza places!!!!). We headed to our hotel which was really nice. Amy, Jacquie, Christina, Alexis (a marine bio student), and I shared a room. Since it was my birthday we decided to go in search of some dessert and drinks before dinner (why not right?!). We found an incredible dessert place which had awesome apple pi and ice cream waffles which we enjoyed with some caipirinhas (a Brazilian drink that is sort of like a mojito, only with lime). From there we headed to dinner which was so delicious and they even did a special birthday surprise for me – a HUGE piece of cake and all the waiters singing “feliz cumpleaños”! They even smashed my face in the cake, a traditional way to celebrate birthdays J It was a great 25^th birthday!

Cake in the face!!

The next two days (Sat. and Sun.) we spent on Santa Cruz. We are going back in a couple weeks so we didn’t spent as much time there. On Sat we traveled to Seymour Island via a pretty sweet yacht. We saw some amazing wildlife including the frigate birds with their huge red chests, inflated because they were preparing to mate. We also saw blue footed boobies and a sea lion who had just given birth!

Mom, baby (with after birth), and a curious bird

Frigate bird with inflated red chest

Blue footed boobies!!

Later in the day we went to a wonderful beach where we spent a couple hours playing the water and enjoying the sand. Unfortunately, there were blue-bottle jelly fish in the water which gave a handful of people some pretty good stings. This is also where I took my underwater camera underwater (go figure) and it broke L Sad day. Therefore, the rest of the pictures for the trip are from various other cameras including Jacquie’s.

That night there were Halloween celebrations all over the island. I really love Halloween so I was excited to hear a group of students were dressing up to go out! We all put on whatever clothing we had to make costumes. A group of us went as “80s girls” with crazy side ponytails and outrageous brightly colored outfits. There were also sports players, trolls, models, and other crazy outfits. We must have looked pretty crazy around town. We went to several discotechs (dance clubs) looking for the best deals and had some fun dancing! A group of us headed back early because we knew we had a big day tomorrow but I know some folks stayed out til the wee hours of the morning.

The best 80s costumes we could come up with!!

Sunday was also an excellent day. First we headed out on a VERY choppy boat ride to go snorkeling. There were nine of us in my group so it was small which was nice. It was really cold but we all jumped in and were rewarded with amazing snorkeling - full of great fish! I started swimming to a slightly deeper area to check out a large school of fish that were swimming really quickly. I dove down to check them out and when I looked out all of sudden SHARK! It was a big guy just lurking about 20ft away. It totally caught us all by surprise but was really cool to see!

Then we were back in the boat to go check out more sharks and iguanas (however, for this view of the sharks we stayed on dry land!). The iguanas were all over the lava rocks - we saw dozens. They aren't dangerous so you can get up real close to them. It felt a little like being in jurassic park - creepy!

A HUGE iguana!

Our last stop of the morning was a river that was partially salt water and partially fresh water cut between two high cliffs. This was the place we went cliff jumping (one of my favorite parts of the trip!!). We climbed up to the top, about 45ft up, and looked down. It was definitely intimidating to see how far down it was but the way the cliffs were there was really little danger of hitting any rocks. They told us to jump like a pencil and so off we went! Jac jumped before me. Unfortunately she started absolutely perfect but by the time she got to the water she had accidentally started to tip backwards causing her landing to be on her back and leaving her with some amazing bruises (but no serious problems). I jumped without any issues - it was the craziest feeling to be in the air for long enough to realize that I was still falling!! It was really freaky the first time but after that I went back and jumped again! Super great adrenaline rush!

Not the best pic but you can get a sense of the heigh even though you can't see the water!

After this we had a break for lunch and then we went to visit a neat lava tunnel which was pretty cool. Finally, we ended at a beach to relax but unfortunately it was pretty chilly. Corinne, Elysse, Travis, and I went in the water but ultimately we left early because both those on land and those in the water were chilly. The night was fairly uneventful although we did do a little shopping and lots of chatting as we got ready to head to Isabella the next day!!