Galapagos

The famous Galapagos Islands lie almost 1000km west of the mainland, at the junction of various ocean currents. The rich ocean upwellings support an amazing variety of marine life, including birds. The isolation of the islands themselves ensures a really exciting set of endemic species - as described so famously by Charles Darwin, whose bicentennial year this was! Habitats are all fairly impoverished, but very distinctive, ranging from bare lava, to arid scrub, to cactus forest, to semi-humid woodlands, depending on altitude and aspect.

While bird diversity is, of course, quite low, the fantastic views you get at point-blank range, and the incredible array of endemic mammals, reptiles, fish and other organisms make it a truly awesome experience!

On the bird front, those leading the charge included Swallow-tailed, Lava and Franklin's Gulls, Brown Noddy, Galapagos Penguin, Lava Heron, Galapagos Hawk, three kinds of Storm-petrels and a fantastic sighting of at least two Galapagos Petrels. Add in Blue-footed and Nazca Boobies, Galapagos Shearwaters, two kinds of frigatebird, tropicbirds, Chatham Mockingbird and numerous 'Darwin's Finches', and we had plenty to see.

There's more, of course - Land and Marine Iguanas, Pacific Green Turtles, Giant Tortoises, White-tipped Reef-shark, Sea Snake sp., Galapagos Sealions, Humpback Whale - where does one stop? Snorkelling with sharks, penguins and sealions really can't be bad.

We shared our tour with 12 others: a family of six from Seattle, and couples from Germany, Turkey via NYC, and Russia - via Utah! We were all very well looked after on board the MV Monsarrat (sic), a distinctly comfortable barque.