Galapagos Islands, Ecuador - Day 8

Sunday, February 20

Today was our first full day in San Cristobal, Galapagos. We all slept terribly last night due to a loud a/c fan that kicked on every 30 minutes in our hotel room. Couple that with hard beds and all sleeping in one room together, and it’s safe to say that we were all dragging this morning.

Since I was up before the sunrise, I attempted to catch up on some blogging but the internet is absolutely brutal in the Galapagos. I couldn’t even get the internet page to load on my computer. I wonder how the locals function living on the island with minimal internet?! It would be hard to run a business, that’s for sure.

Breakfast was provided by our hotel this morning, so our family of four sat on the artistic, mosaic-clad outdoor patio and ate fruit, bread, yogurt and scrambled eggs with coffee & hot chocolate. I think we might be the only guests staying at this small hotel because I haven’t seen anyone else roaming about. That’d be a shame really, because despite our poor night of sleep the hotel itself is very charming. The entire place is decorated with artwork and mosaic tile and the owner seems friendly.

Andi asked the owner over breakfast if we could change hotel rooms. The owner didn’t seem to mind — he said we could change to a room with two double beds and since it is located on the first floor, the a/c motor wouldn’t run all night. So, after breakfast we transferred all our luggage to the other room.

Once we were settled, the four of us walked into San Cristobal to check out the town and to visit the interpretive center. Already, Andi and I liked the feel of San Cristobal Island better than Santa Cruz. This island is smaller and prettier, and has hundreds of sea lions scattered about the sidewalks and beaches.

San Cristobal’s Interpretive Center is located all the way at the end of the Main Street near Playa Mann. Even so, walking there took us about 15 minutes. The interpretive center is free admission and shared a wealth of information about the history of the Galapagos Islands. We really enjoyed it.

Through the interpretive center, visitors can also access Punta Carola Beach and Tijeretas Hill — two great places to swim and see wildlife on the island. We didn’t walk as far to these points of interest though, because we were all hot and hungry. Instead, we returned to Playa Mann to have lunch and enjoy the beach for a bit.

For lunch, we stopped at a local spot on the beach. Actually, there were three local restaurants serving customers under one tent & it was hard to tell where one restaurant ended and the next began. We sat at the only open table there was & ordered 3 almuerzo plates that included soup, choice of protein, rice, beans, salad and juice for $5.

Our meals came with giant frozen juices in the flavors we’d specified — strawberry for Tory, mango for Aden and coconut for Andi and I. I’m not sure why we got frozen fruit smoothies while every other table in the three different restaurants got natural juice with there meals, but nonetheless they were delicious and hit the spot! It was really hot outside and did the trick to cool us off.

Two different soups were offered as part of the almuerzo lunch special, so I ordered two bowls of chicken soup and one bowl of sopa de marinera which I assumed was some sort of tomato-based soup, but it was actually a fish soup. It wouldn’t have been my first choice, but it was actually pretty good. Very flavorful. Aden doesn't like soup, but I picked out the pieces of fish and put them on a plate for him. He liked it, too.

Nothing like eating soup at the beach… that’s just the way of life in Ecuador.

Three almuerzo lunch specials and four juice smoothies for $23 — not a bad price for four people!

After lunch, the four of us spread out our beach blanket on Playa Mann and hung out at the beach for the afternoon. The small beach was pretty busy with locals and tourists alike, as well as sea lions. They were everywhere! The Galapagos sea lions looked adorable when we saw them on the more remote islands of Isabela and Santiago, but on San Cristobal Island they are numerous, loud and smelly. We watched some of the sea lions chase people out of the shallow parts of the ocean where they were swimming and one barreled right toward Tory while she was sitting on our beach blanket. The sea lions won’t hurt anyone, but they are smelly and quite loud.

Aden has been begging for a snow-cone on this trip, and Andi spotted a vendor on the beach. He returned with a snow-cone for Aden and three soft-serve ice cream cones for Tory, himself and I. Usually I’m not big on ice cream treats when we travel, but it was really hot outside and the cool ice cream tasted great. Even though Aden has been begging and begging for a snow-cone, it turned out he wasn’t such a big fan of it after all. Andi said the son-cone vendor poured sweetened condensed milk over the top of it — maybe that’s why.

Around 4:00pm, the four of us walked back to Hotel Katarma on the other side of Main Street. We stopped at the San Cristobal sign for a picture along the way, and at the playground so Tory and Aden could climb around for a bit.

Tory and Aden wanted to swim in the hotel pool when we got back, so I sat outside with them for a bit while Andi ran to get his haircut & dinner to-go for Tory and Aden. Andi and I wanted sushi tonight and we knew the kids would probably rather something simpler. Andi returned about an hour later looking sharp with his new haircut & armed with a tasty cheese empanada for Tory and an order of sachipapa for Aden. I knew Aden would like the sachipapa I’ve seen on some Ecuadorian menus — hot dog and French fries — right up his alley!

Tory took a bite of her cheese empanada and out came her tooth! She’s been complaining about it being loose for the last week, but we weren’t expecting it to come out this quickly. Tory worried that the tooth fairy wouldn’t be able to find her in Ecuador, but I assured her not to worry — the tooth fairy is magic. Nevertheless, she wrote a sweet note to the tooth fairy thanking her for coming & asked that the tooth fairy please take Tory’s tooth with her because Tory had nowhere to put it while traveling.

Once the kids’ dinners were taken care of, Andi and I enjoyed a few sushi rolls and fresh tuna from the sushi restaurant in town called Midori. The food there was excellent.

We’re hoping for a quieter night of sleep tonight in our new hotel room — even though Andi and I have to each share a full-size bed with a kid. Tomorrow is another full day in San Cristobal.