Traveling is a concept that is viewed differently by everyone. Traveling to some is seen as planning everything out by booking a flight, hotel and tours ahead of time. To others they consider traveling throwing a few pieces of clothes into a backpack and taking off to see what they run into. However one chooses to define traveling it almost always results in memories and stories that last a lifetime. Our adventures so far in the Galapagos have resulted in a mixture of both of these types of travel and have left us with stories we will never forget.
Trying to avoid the common expensive tours of the Galapagos as much as possible we decided our first adventure should be a surf adventure. After surfing a local beach break on Santa Cruz Island we soon realized from the locals that much better waves were to be found on San Cristobel Island. Unable to take our boat to other ports without buying a very expensive and we are still not sure if legal Autographo, we booked a fairy over to San Cristobel. We must have had the surf gods with us because for the next few days we were blessed with one of the best swells they have had all year. For three days we made the two mile hike to the small beach with a left point that ended up acting more like our hotel than the one we were paying for back in town. We put up a tarp and lied out our board bags so that when we could no longer take the intense sun that comes with being right on the equator we would have some protection. The sun’s intensity forced us to return to town for a siesta around noon but we always mustered up the energy to make it back out for an afternoon session. The smiles brought on from crystal clear water and perfect waves could not be peeled off our faces, even when walking through the scorching midday heat with no shade and no water left. The first morning we surfed with one or two other guys but by the afternoon the news had spread through town and people came out of the cracks to share in the gift the ocean had delivered. The mentality of everyone in the Galapagos is so overwhelming. The Californian surfer mentality of say nothing of waves and don’t even attempt to paddle out on a good day unless you are a local is no where to be found. Walking in each day everyone was so stoked and sharing the news of the waves. In the water they was even more inviting. Nobody had a sense of entitlement but rather focused all their energy on truly enjoying the double overhead waves that were peeling through! With sunburned faces and arms that felt like Jell-O we headed back to our boat after four days about as content and fulfilled as we have ever been. Surfing amazing waves, in crystal clear water, with sea turtles popping up as you take off is going to be a really hard memory to beat. If it is even possible!
To see the Galapagos you are really left with no other choice than to book at least a few tours since all the islands are protected national parks. We decided to go on a snorkel tour of one of the islands in the Galapagos archipelago, Floreana. We took another boat for the day and snorkeled two different spots that were absolutely amazing. We snorkeled through tunnels with sea turtles, saw the Galapagos white tip shark, swam with tons of Tuna, Mahi, Manta Rays and sea lions. Seeing Sea Lions made us feel like we were back home except for the fact that these ones were so friendly. Once in the water with them they were doing flips around us. One came right up to us blew bubbles in our face and swam back through my legs. It was amazing to experience the pristine diving of the Galapagos. The captains of the boat that we were on were both a few years younger than us and were also surfers. They ended up buying one of our surfboards from us the next day but not without quite an adventure.
The next day after our snorkel tour to Floreana, we saw the captains, Chino and Eric motoring past us on a panga with a few friends and surfboards. After screaming and waving at them in hopes of joining them to surf a place called “Chicken Hill” they finally heard us and turned around. We conversed in our broken Spanish and their little to no English about selling our surfboard and going seeing if we could go surfing with them. Within a few minutes we were tying our dingy back to the boat and loading our boards into the panga to go surf for the Day. Or so we thought! We were so excited as we motored past the inaccessible beaches of Santa Cruz Island. It was asolutly beautiful and so much more meaningful to be exploring it with locals than on a tour. After about and hour we pulled into a beautiful bay with yet another fun left breaking just next to us. Anxious to get in we started to fumble for our boards when they told us “un momento!” They continued to bring the boat furthur into the bay. With in a few moments they had anchored up and began unpacking. We looked at each other thinking it would be much easier to just drop anchor and surf for a few hours and then leave but as it was not our boat we kept our mouths shut. That was when we looked down and saw that they unpacking camping stuff that was conveniently hidden down below the bow of the panga. Both of our faces dropped as we looked at each other and then at them. "Todo personas camping?" "No regresso ahoy?" The answer was not the one we were looking for. “No! camping.” “Regresso manana en la tarde. WAIT! " No comprendo tu es camping!" “No tengo ropa,comida, or tent(no idea what tent is in Spanish but we made the hand gestures to try and explain.)” Needless to say we were not prepared for the night we were about to endure. Camping with nothing is one thing. It can be a little uncomfortable, dirty and cold but still enjoyable. Camping with about one million mosquitos’s, with no tent and only bathing suits and surfboards is totally different. We truly got a dose of uncomfortable. One of the girls couldn’t help herself from laughing at the situation when she realized we didn’t understand that they were camping and we had nothing! I was a little annoyed by this but looking back I probably would have done the same!
After a surf session in the afternoon we went and tried to help set up the few items they had brought for the night. Chino, Eric and Eduardo went to go find fish for dinner while Brandon and I walked in circles around the little beach because if we stopped for to long we would be completely mauled by mosquitos. After somewhat coming to terms with the fact that we were here for the night I began helping the girls collect firewood from a tree that they call the Holy tree of Santa Tomas. They call it this because when you burn the branches it helps to keeps the mosquito’s away. It may be their holy tree but by no means does it keep the mosquitos away. When Chino and the others returned they had actually got lucky and had caught 4 fresh Yellow Tailed Tuna. AHI! It was really amazing to watch them prepare the fish with practically nothing. They used the lava rocks as their cutting board and with in a few minutes of cleaning the fish we had fresh sushi that was amazing. That night we each cooked our own huge fillet which was prepared in cilantro, lime, peppers and tomatos. It was delicious! Watching these kids that were our age or younger be so resourceful and live more or less completely off the land was really refreshing. It made us both feel pretty pathetic for complaining about some mosquito’s but my god they were horrendous! Mosquito’s or not we still found ourselves laughing around a campfire, drinking some random alcohol called "Cana", that kind of tastes like a mix between bad wine and vodka, and listening to all of them sing Ecuadorian songs. That night we slept in our bating suits on our board bags looking up at the millions of stars and realized how lucky we were to be able to experience this even if we were miserably uncomfortable. Some how we managed to sleep on and off for the majority of the night but were felt relieved to say the least when the sun began to rise and we realized we had made it through the night without being completely destroyed by mosquito’s.
We are still searching for all the words to explain what we learned, felt and experienced on this trip. There were a million ways to approach an experience like this. It was just another way of traveling and it was up to us to put ourselves in a mindset where we could appreciate what we were experiencing. We may have not been prepared and did not have the comforts of a hotel room or even a tent for that matter but we saw and experienced the Galapagos in a way we will never forget. We met people who were so sweet and gracious, saw land that is barely ever visited and surfed untouched waves. As we pulled out of the anchorage our friend Chino yelled out "Ciao Mosquito’s no mas bailar con tu!" -Good bye mosquito’s no more dancing with you! AMEN! As we had nothing with us we missed probably one of the best photo experiences of our trip but the story and the memories we will have for a lifetime.
