Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands

March 29, 2018

Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands

It's been a crazy March break this year at LCS. The way that Easter lined up with our normal two-week break, the school decided that it wasn't worth opening for the 3 days between our March break and Easter so we ended up with a 26 day spring break. And the trip that I was leaving ended up taking off 2 days before break started, so I ended up with a full 4 week break from classes.

Early morning on March 7, I loaded up on a bus with 14 amazing students and another teacher for what I will always remember as one of the most amazing travel experiences I've ever had. We were going to spend just over 12 days on the equator, traveling and exploring the city of Quito, the Galapagos Islands of San Cristobal and Santa Cruz, and an Andes mountain villages near Chimborazo.

Without going into the minutia of the daily itinerary, I will summarize the trip as chock-full of great sights, amazing food, and spectacular company. Every location offered up new experiences and a glimpse into Latin American life (something of a more personal interest since taking the job in Colombia). Even with the issues that pop up with travel (flight troubles, exhaustion, etc.) I don't think I could have asked for a better experience, which was solely because of the amazing people I was fortunate enough to travel with. I've always known I was lucky to work with a different calibre of students at LCS, and this trip just made me realize how much I'm going to miss these kids when I'm not back to the school next year.

Though I could find something that I loved about every single day on the trip, my personal highlight of the trip would always have to be our snorkeling day off the coast of San Cristobal Island at Kicker Rock. I had never done any snorkeling in my life other than a little bit of playing around with a mask and fins at the cottage in the cold and murky waters of Georgian Bay. Within the first minute of slipping into the clear, warm waters off Kicker Rock I saw more fish than I'd ever seen.

We lost count of the different types of fish we swam with, as well as the dozens of Galapagos sharks drifting slowly along. The kids in my group saw a large ray that I missed while looking the wrong way, but later on it was made up for by getting to see three Hammerheads swimming deep below us that the rest of my group missed.

I had one thing I wanted more than anything else on this day: to swim with sea turtles. I was so worried that I wasn't going to see any that I didn't say anything about this desire to anyone so that I could keep my disappointment to myself. Fortunately, we were about halfway around Kicker Rock when we came across the first of three sea turtles we'd see around the rock. I'm still blown away at how majestic these creatures are, looking like they're slowly and gracefully flying through the water. Even though they were all quite deep and we weren't able to get too close to them, when it was time to get back on the boat I felt such an overwhelming contentment. Little did I know that after a quick lunch on the boat and a shorter trip to a nearby beach that my day was going to get even better!

After a lunch that included some of the freshest tuna steaks I'm ever likely to have, we were given several hours at a secluded beach to enjoy the sun and get in a little more snorkeling if we wanted to. I've never been a huge fan of just laying on a beach, so I grabbed my mask and fins to do a little exploring around the cove we anchored in. Words cannot describe just how amazing the next hour was for me as I was able to swim up close with almost half a dozen different sea turtles from distances as close as 2 meters. While none of my group had a GoPro with us, I was able to make friends with an Australian who was with us and arrange a trade of some maple syrup for a copy of his footage. I'll upload some of it here and on my Instagram when that happens!

Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands are definitely places that I would recommend to anyone looking for some fun in the sun, while seeing some of the most spectacular wildlife on the planet. If you're in Quito, look up La Casa Sol if you're looking for a good hostel near the touristy area. And you can follow Hacienda Tranquila (our home on San Cristobal) on Instagram @haciendatranquila.