Day 12 - October 11, 2011

Our flight last night started at 10:00pm. After arriving at the airport in Quito a few hours early to check in, we waited for our flight to depart. Our flight left on time and we arrived in Santiago in the morning, waited a couple of hours for our connecting flight to Easter Island, and landed at around noon.

Arriving in Easter Island was a little culture shock, as it wasn't already in the previous cities we visited. However, everyone there was extremely nice and although some only knew how to speak Spanish, we got around pretty well. We arrived at our hotel and had some minor miscommunication with the tours we had booked but it all eventually got sorted out.

We settled in and since we didn't have any tours planned for today, we decided to head out to town to roam around. As you'll see in the pictures, the area is pretty rural, with chickens running around and wild horses too! The Island's only town, Hanga Roa, has a population of 5,000 people...and there's an estimate of 4,000 wild horses! The Island has so much history and facts that 1) I can't even remember and 2) whatever I do remember there's just too much to talk about.

After 10 minutes of walking, we were in town. Again, everyone there is really nice, so some locals from the shops we went into helped us get around. We had a map in hand so it made it easy to get around the little town. After having lunch, we popped in a few stores to do some window shopping, and also grabbed some groceries like cookies and bread because for some reason we thought we'd be starving later on that night. Also, we have a thing about going into grocery stores in other countries just to see what type of products they have. We took our time in the town to just relax and take in the fresh air and ocean views from the harbour. At around 500pm, we made our way back and just got ready for the next day. I wasn't feeling that well, actually, so I was in bed by 7ish.

Landing in Easter Island.

Walking into down; it would often rain for a few minutes and then the sun would be out, and repeat

The famous statues here in Easter Island, called Moai, aren't protected that well. You can simply walk up to it and give it a hug if you wanted to because it's in its natural state and no walls or barriers surround it, other than some signs and rocks.  It's actually against the law to go past a certain point; we witnessed a couple who were obviously tourists walk up right beside the Moai and were stopped by the police. They were actually taken into the police car and they drove away!

The harbour at the town; we sat here and just watched people boogie board, learn how to surf, and workers coming in and out of land on those boats to a much bigger fishing boat to gather fresh fish.

Day 11 - October 10, 2011

Back in Quito! where the altitude is high and the streets are steep!

The start of our flight to Easter Island didn't take off until 1000pm today, so we had most of the day to take advantage of. We booked a city tour with Gap Adventures along with a couple from Australia that was on the same Galapagos trip with us. We were driven around the city with a tour guide and he told us about the city's history and facts. We also did some walking as the streets were too busy, and also because we visited many churches and stores. After lunch, we drove up to a look out point and took a few pics before making our way back to the hotel.

We relaxed a bit, finished packing our things, grabbed a quick bite to eat, and made our way to the airport for our second leg of the race!

From our hotel (same hotel as the first night); had a much better view this time.

One of many churches in Quito.

Steep streets + high altitude = ssssllloowww.

City's square.

Another church.

Yet another.

Look out point.

Day 10 - October 09, 2011

Last "day" at Galapagos :(

We woke up a little earlier today and went on our last excursion. I'm glad they still fit in an excursion on the last day to maximize our time there. It was a quick excursion, 1.5hrs, but it gave us a chance to see the frigate birds during their mating season.

The entire trip, from when we first got on the boat, we saw frigate birds all around us. They would land on our boat, fly along the boat or the beach, sometimes just one, and sometimes a dozen, but since they're flying, they're not in their "mating" mode. We visited North Seymour this morning, the location where the frigate birds mate. The males have the red "pouch" on their chest; they land, puff it up, show it off, and wait for a female to swoop down to check him out. It was great to see how the birds attract others with their features.

After our short visit on North Seymour, we made our way back on the boat and sailed back to Baltra Island where we started the trip. We all gathered our things and checked in at the airport and made our way back to Quito.

We landed back in Quito. We had a really nice evening actually. We checked back in to our hotel in the afternoon and met up with most of our group from the trip in the evening for dinner. It was really nice because we had a nice big group to go out and get a bite to eat and chat. The actual Galapagos trip was amazing, but the people we travelled with made it special. The boat was small and we pretty much had two areas to hang out; our cabins or in the lounge area. Every day we had funny/serious/casual conversations with everyone on board, and everyone enjoyed each other’s company. So that evening was nice because although we finished our trip, everyone was still up to get together and hang out.

Overall, this was an excellent trip and a different trip than our previous vacations. This was an adventure to South America with long flights, different terrain, and the main point of the trip, the wildlife. We couldn't really prepare ourselves for this trip as we did with our others, but we had everything we needed thanks to our travel agent and also talking to friends that have been on the same trip. Galapagos Islands is definitely a place to visit and we're glad we did it. But, our trip wasn't over! We made our way to Easter Island a couple days after, so stay tuned!