Amazon and Galapagos Pictures

[Veronica]

Finally we're getting our pictures up.



Snorkeling with the sea lions. They would just zoom right by us, like they were playing.



Blue footed boobie with two chicks. One will not survive, but they always hatch two.



Would you eat this?



Tastes like chicken, seriously. The outside was like fried chicken, the inside had the texture of a steak fry.



This is taken from the back porch of our room. A troop of them would parade by every day around 1 PM.

We have tons more photos on our website. They are in three different galleries.

http://tandemhearts.smugmug.com/Trav...d-Sacha-Lodge/

http://tandemhearts.smugmug.com/Trav...-to-4/n-ftnZJ/

http://tandemhearts.smugmug.com/Trav...-to-8/n-JMhRs/

It was an absolutely amazing trip. I don't feel like we missed anything in the Galapagos, but both of us wished we had had more time in the rain forest at the lodge.

Veronica

[PamNY]

Fantastic photos. I admit I am envious! Glad you had a good trip.

[Blueberry]

Those photos are beautiful, Veronica - as always! Thank you for taking the time to share them

[OakLeaf]

Wow.

[salsabike]

Love the kid pics! Weaving, monkeys, birds, seals. Wonderful stuff. Did you like the tour guides?

[Veronica]

Going to the Kichwa village was really amazing. I have seen a couple different spellings of that. We weren't suppose to go into any of the classrooms, but this one teacher invited us in. His students had prepared a song for us in their native language and then wanted us to sing one for them. We had Americans, Brits, a New Zealand couple and a Russian couple in our group. What song could we all know? We all had deer in the headlights faces when they asked. Then I came up with "Row, Row Your Boat". We sang two rounds for them. The best part is the kids are the same age as my students.

We were worried the visit to the village would be kind of invasive and like they were on display, but we didn't go to any of their private dwellings. I thought it was really well done to give tourists a sense of what their lives are like. They did have handiwork for sale and we did have to pay for the meal of grubs and tilapia, but it was relatively cheap. I bought some cute key rings made from seeds that I will sell in my classroom auction.

The guides were fantastic. In the rainforest we had two guides - a native guide and a naturalist guide. Walter, the Native guide, would see animals that we had no idea were there and point them out. Fausto was our naturalist guide and he was really good at explaining the things we saw. They were both Kichwa natives. Walter didn't speak any English. Fausto had taught himself English and was great about teaching me Spanish words for things as we saw them.

On the boat there is a mandatory limit of 16 people per naturalist guide for the Galapagos. Those guides have to get certified by what's basically like our National Park Service. We had three guides and did activities with all three of them. They were incredibly knowledgeable and their command of English was astounding. We came home determined to learn Spanish.

We did our booking through GeoEx so we also had guides in Quito and Quayaquil and a driver. I'm so happy we had a driver! Those guides were also very good. The entire trip was just astounding.

Veronica