Birds and Land Iguanas
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FW: 00:44.9125S 090:18.454W Thu 19th March Slightly unnerving start to the day when the four of us
arrived at the tour agents to find that he had forgotten to make the
booking. He reacted by disappearing, reappearing, getting stroppy,
disappearing again, reappearing, making a phone call and then announcing that
there were only two places left now and it wasn’t his fault; which it
clearly was. Ria and Duncan immediately said that we should take the
places as they will be there for another couple of weeks. We had about 5
seconds to discuss this as the agent was getting more stroppy and threatening
to cancel. His phone kept ringing which we suspect was his boss chivvying
him because by now this was holding the tour up. We were bundled into a
taxi waiting outside with the engine running and then driven at some speed
across the island until we caught up with the coach. This time we had a National Park Guide who was fabulous;
full of knowledge and made a lot of effort to spot things. We sailed out
to Seymour Norte, a small, uninhabited island where the famous Blue Footed
Boobies and Frigate Birds are abundant along with an assortment of other
seabirds, finches and land iguana’s. All the wildlife is very
accessible and not at all distressed by having people around as the close up
photographs show. We were particularly surprised that even nesting birds
let you get very close.
We were very pleased to meet up with Dominik again and
another charming young man, Will. Dominik manages the Swiss Triathlon
team and it was fascinating hearing about the sport at the elite level and his
experiences at the Beijing Olympics. Will had spent a month volunteering
in Ecuador and four months before that in Seville so his Spanish was
excellent. He is on his way to Harvard but not sure yet whether he will
do Medicine, Architecture or History! Fortunately the first year will be
the same so he doesn’t need to choose in a hurry. We had a really
good time in their company. To be continued......... |
