Day 7 Galapagos (afternoon): Puerto Ayora, Santa Cruz Island

Diane: I didn’t want to miss the Charles Darwin Research Station, where much of the conservation work of the islands started. Visitors are allowed to walk amidst the slow-moving tortoises, who are now relatively comfortable around people and their cameras. We were able to get some wonderful close-ups..


































In addition to the walk-in areas for the adult tortoises, there is a baby tortoise house with incubators. Once they are big enough, these little guys are transported back to their native islands. We were also quite fortunate to get a good look at Lonesome George, the only known survivor of his subspecies - the Isla Pinta tortoise.

How big are these guys anyway?

We, slow-moving people, also made for some good photo subjects.

This excursion was the only one in which the whole family went in the same group. Our cruise mate, Linda, took a picture of all of us, but only after falling and scraping up her hand pretty badly on the ubiquitous lava rocks.