The Exploritas (previously Elderhostel) Galapagos Adventure program is a "once in a lifetime" experience for most people.  This website is dedicated to the seven brave Elderhostel adventurers who endured wet landings, dry landings, watching one of the pangas (Zodiac boats) turn over in an atypical large wave, and a minor problem raising the boat's anchor at four in the morning (have you ever seen a flashing navigation buoy five feet under water, fouled in the anchor line?).  

Our boat, the TipTop II

All in all, it was a fantastic trip, with wonderful travelers, great guides and crew, and a chance to see the Galapagos Archipelago that in most ways remains unchanged from Darwin's description when he visited more than 150 years ago.  At one point, I was sitting on a beach, surrounded by birds, reptiles, and sea lions. It occurred to me that this environment would certainly lend itself to the notion that we are just one of the animals, with attributes that were advantageous to our development and ability to survive and propagate our species.

As I was searching the net for information, I stumbled across a blog written by "Tina" who took the same trip in January 2009, on the Tip Top II, with the same naturalist, Carlos!  The blog pays excellent attention to detail and I would recommend reading it for another perspective of the trip.  She has excellent writing skills! The link to the blog is here.

On the various Day Home pages general mention is made of various plants, birds, and animals.  No attempt has been made to identify all of these species.  Furthermore, there is much information available on the net about the geographical features of the various islands.  One website that sums all of this information up, with pictures and maps is called "Jungle Photos Galapagos--Images of life's wonder!".  I would recommend that you open this site as a tab on your browser so that you can identify wildlife and other features that you see in the group photos.  Use the topic menu on the left hand side of the page to choose Animals, Plants, Birds, Etc.

Now some housekeeping chores.  The website is organized by day.  The first day is consumed by just getting to Quito, Ecuador.  And, the last day consists of managing to get ourselves back home to various parts of the United States.  In between we have pictures of everything that we could possibly take a picture of in order to document our trip.  The pictures are contributed by our fellow travelers, with most coming from Patrick, Corinne, and me.  When viewing the group pictures, or even the whole site, you might get even better views if you use your F11 key to allow the browser to use full screen mode. The pictures on all of the home pages are from the internet, with one or two exceptions.  These pictures will help you orient yourself to the time and place of the group pictures.  The itinerary for the trip can be found here.  The pages with Thumbnail pictures of the Group Photos are going to load slowly.  With several thousand pictures, there is not much that can be done about this inconvenience.  If you are on a dial-up connection, go make a cup of coffee...or maybe go out to lunch!

The Elderhostel Galapagos adventure is physically more demanding than some of the other programs.  It has recently been changed from a physical rating of 4 to a rating of 5, based on feedback of past participants.  Walking on lava boulders is not particularly easy and climbing a huge number of steps to get to the top of one of the volcanoes requires some stamina.  Shortly before the trip, Exploritas (Elderhostel) sent out a booklet that was printed on an inkjet printer, showing a pretty accurate picture of what to expect.  Check it out here.  If you find some problems or errors, or just want to say you enjoyed the website :-) you can write the webmaster here. 

Now go up and click the Day 1 link in the left hand margin and lets start our adventure!