Galápagos Islands - Léon Dormido

Today we could sleep in until 7 😅 but still woke up a while before. We packed a few things that we might need for the tour and then walked to the dive shop which was empty because we've been too early. We still had half an hour left so I tried finding a coffee shop, it took a little while but then we were successful. The chocolate croissant 🥐 was a perfect companion and then the day could start!
We walked a few metres to the pier where we watched the sea lions and talked to the other tour guests from the US and UK mostly. The tour guide was knowledgeable and friendly and explained the schedule for the day. One group was going to dive, the other snorkeling. We had thought about diving but after we've seen so many hammerheads in the first one and also have the flight tomorrow, it doesn't make sense. Also at the tunnels tour we've been told by divers that the snorkeling is probably more pleasant as there are quite strong currents and the visibility is better. We saw some frigate birds and boobies on the way to the spot where we were about to snorkel. We jumped in the water and then navigated along the colourful walls of Kicker Rock... It was buzzing with all kinds of life forms, right in the beginning a sea turtle swam next to us. Further along the way we saw hammerhead sharks and groups of eagle and golden rays. Overall we spent 1.5 hours in the water exploring all around and through Kicker Rock! An amazing place to see the underwater 🫧 world. Right after we got out, the divers group started their second dive and it started to rain a little bit which was great to wash off the salt water ☺️

Next up we navigated to a nearby beach for an amazing lunch in buffet style on the boat. Especially great because they had vegetarian and even vegan options! The crew was super friendly and helpful with any requests, we felt comfortable. The last stop was to get ashore and relax in the sun, snorkel or walk a bit. It was interesting that only the beach we were at had sun, the rest of the island was in heavy rain clouds ☀️🌧️
We grabbed the snorkeling gear and went to a nearby rocky area, soon a group of three sea lions (a mother with two puppies) joined us and they were super playful 🤩 Blowing bubbles to us, swimming around in the bubbles we made, getting up close to the camera... It was a magical experience to be up close to these cute, social and playful animals. Especially it was their free will to come to us and check us out 🥰 We spent almost the whole hour that we had there with them... It was difficult to leave but we had to go back 🥹

On the way back we chilled on the front of the boat and watched the island pass by. When we came back we were a little tired but we needed to switch hotels and then we wanted to go see a nearby walk up to a viewpoint and beaches, called Cerro Tijeretas. So we just quickly checked in and then walked the 2km to the interpretation center and also the start of the trail. It leads up a lovely volcanic stone trail to the viewpoint overlooking the town and all the way to Kicker Rock. When we arrived there was a rainbow 🌈 above Kicker Rock which made a beautiful view 😍 It started raining a little bit when we continued the loop to a statue of Darwin and the most famous animals of the Galápagos Islands. There would've also been a snorkeling spot but we didn't bring it and we've done enough snorkeling for the day 😅

The trail led back down to a beautiful little beach where there were some sea lions and a lot of puppies. So some of them were protective and it was a good idea to stay away from the puppies... Not everyone did and the parents loudly intervened 😁 It started raining heavily when we wanted to walk to the lighthouse so we decided to return back to town as we were completely soaked... There we discovered that we had gotten a pretty bad sunburn on the back ☀️🔥🦞 We went back to the same restaurant as yesterday as I really wanted to try the grilled shrimps 🦐

We walked through town and enjoyed the last evening here... Then we were once again interrupted by the parade of the other political party 🙈 It was okay though as we needed to go back to the hotel anyways.Læs mere