Santa Cruz Island

Situated next to Academy Bay, Puerto Ayora is the biggest town of the Galápagos archipelago with numbers bordering around 25,000 people who live here, giving life to this busy Ecuadorian port located 600 nautical miles off the coast of the mainland. The main activity of the local people here is tourism and the town itself developed after the emblematic species of the islands, the Galápagos giant tortoises.

The Spanish word Galápagos translates into saddleback, which is the shape of the shell that these creatures have in these very arid ecosystems of the islands that comprise this archipelago. Not having enough to eat at ground level, these creatures of the arid zones need to raise up their heads to be able to feed on the leaves of the trees. This adaption of the head has deformed the carapace, giving them the saddleback shape. On the other end, there are dome-shaped shells, the opposite to the saddleback tortoises. Tortoises with dome-shaped shells live on islands that have a higher altitude which means a permanent presence of rain water that makes the vegetation of the islands very lush. The tortoises here forage on the ground without having to raise their heads while feeding. As a result of this, the creatures in this kind of habitat are much bigger in size and have a grand round shape.

The Galápagos National Park Service, together with the Charles Darwin Research Station, have established a breeding center to save the giant tortoises of the Galápagos from extinction. Some populations of these beautiful reptiles became endangered due to the presence of alien species.

At this time of the year, which is the hot rainy season, the giant tortoises begin to breed and migrate to the lowlands looking for suitable places in which to nest. We walked slowly and admired 12 individuals that for different reasons have remained in the area.

At approximately 1,900 feet we encountered a thick forest with lots of mosses and lichens covering the trees. It looked as if we were suddenly transported to a rain forest. We had a great time observing the endemic Galápagos giant daisies (Scalesia), as well as some of the most prized birds of the archipelago that are found only in this kind of ecosystem. We spotted small tree finches, a woodpecker finch, and vegetarian finches.

Having read about them… and wanting to see them badly… having them in front of us just exceeded our expectations!!!