Galapagos

Highlights

Santiago and nearby northern islands

Santiago (James) Island

Sullivan Bay: gives a chance to walk over a recent barren lava flow. The black, basaltic lava is about 100 years old, but looks like it only just cooled into shapes reminiscent of intestines, ropes and ripples on a pond. It has flowed around older cinder cones.

Puerto Egas (James Bay): Once a haven to pirates and salt miners. A beautiful natural landscape – the path goes along a rocky shore - where large marine iguanas and sally lightfoot crabs abound. In the tidepools brittle stars, urchins and sea snails hide among anemones. Moray eels slither, octopus keep a wary eye or two on you. The trail ends at the fur seal grottoes; enchanting natural pools where both species of sea lion rest and play.

Bartolomé
The most photographed landscape in the islands is the dramatic view from the summit. The Pinnacle that leans into the bay is an eroded cone. A small family of Galapagos penguins lives in the shadows of the Pinnacle, and surprise bemused swimmers as they 'fly' around in the waters of the bay.

A short walk across dunes takes one to the beach (reef sharks, rays and Ghost crabs). Often a juvenile Galápagos hawk hovering overhead. From January to March you may see marine turtles coming ashore to nest in the sand.

Genovesa (Tower) Island
It is a long sail up to Genovesa but worthwhile. You sail into a huge sunken crater bordered by cliffs. Genovesa is home to the biggest colony of red-footed boobies, and many great frigate birds.

Darwin Bay: has a small white coral sand beach, behind is a lagoon which gives the impression of a rock garden. (Herons, white-cheeked pintail ducks, Galapagos doves, lava gulls, swallow-tailed gulls, great frigatebirds, Red-footed boobies, finches, marine iguanas).

Prince Philip's Steps: along the cliffs fur seals in the crevices, Red-billed tropic-birds screech overhead with the greedy frigatebirds in pursuit. The trail has plenty to see (masked boobies, red-footed boobies, storm petrels, owls).

Rábida (Jervis)
The bright red beach is backed by saltbush, which hides a saltwater lagoon, with mangrove trees beyond (brown pelicans, pintail ducks, black-necked stilts are found and flamingos have been known to breed). A short trail goes up steeply to a good vantage point. (Darwin's finches and Palo Santo trees).

Back on the beach the rocks to the East make a perfect place to learn to snorkel. Schools of reef fish like damsels, surgeons, triggers and larger groupers and puffer fish make it an attractive place to plunge beneath the waves.

Sombrero Chino (Chinese Hat)
Only visited by the smallest yachts, Sombrero Chino has one of the most picturesque anchorage's set in a turquoise coloured bay. The island is one cinder cone, with a steep sided crown like a chinese hat. The island is barren apart from sparse lava cactus. Sea lion cubs are left in a 'nursery' by the beach, and a solitary male keeps guard. Sally lightfoot crabs and iguanas congregate on the rocks.