Ecuador trip 14-30 December 2019
Following on to our Alaska trip for my 60th birthday, Karen arranged a major trip to Ecuador for her 60th birthday, surrounded by family and friends - her favorite way to travel.
By way of background, I should note that I organized some of our early excursions when we were young. These turned out to be less than luxurious. For example, we hiked inn-to-inn on the Long Trail in Vermont for our honeymoon. Although this might sound great, it was in late May and we encountered some wretched weather on our last day. It was absolutely bone-chilling rain, ending up with a 1000 foot skid on our butts down a muddy slope. The weather was so severe that our Inn was about to call in the National Guard to search for us. Fortunately, we made it out none the worse for the wear. Some years later, I organized a canoe trip in the Boundary Waters Canoe area, which featured a torrential downpour that flooded out a campsite, and we bailed for the warmth of a hunting lodge.
Since then, Karen has taken over our outings where there is a 'strict no suffering' policy, as my friend Dan would say. I am in no way writing about this trip as a high-level daring adventure full of peril - it was well catered, but nonetheless very rich in experience, and I think everyone had a fantastic time.
The group on this vacation was larger than the Alaska group, and the itinerary itself was more ambitious. Here is the cast:
Me - somewhat scatterbrained academic, who plays banjo
Karen - loving spouse (she likes the term 'spouse' over 'husband', 'wife', or 'partner')
James - eldest son, who plays guitar and brought along my backpacking guitar
Janice - James' partner
Phoebe - eldest daughter - working for the DOJ in Manhattan
Charlotte - younger daughter - working in finance in Santiago, Chile
Marion - Karen's friend from when she was a teenager
Maddie - Marion's daughter, and Karen's goddaughter, who I recently learned was named for Madeline Albright
Renee - Karen's friend from when she was four years old
Kara - Renee's daughter
Cathy and Ken Carlson - Karen's sister and her husband
Jonathan Carlson - Cathy and Ken's eldest son
Netta and Jim - Close friends from Petaluma California
The whole crew behind a Galapagos giant tortoise on Santa Cruz Island, Galapagos. From left, Janice, James, Phoebe, me, Charlotte, Karen, Jim, Netta, Marion, Maddie, Renee, Kara, Jonathan, Ken, and Cathy.
The trip consisted of roughly four parts:
1.) The Napo Wildlife Center in the Amazon basin
2.) Quito - capital city at 9000 ft. above sea level
3.) Galapagos Islands
4.) Hacienda Zuleta in the foot-hills of the Andes, also at 9000 feet
Napo Wildlife Center (15-18 December)
Charlotte couldn't make it for this part of the trip, as she had work obligations down in Santiago, but joined us for the rest of the trip. Fourteen of us made our way to the airport in Quito through various routes, from Boston, Portland OR, New York City, San Diego, and San Francisco. We had a quick overnight at the local airport hotel, then boarded a plane for Coca, a small city at the confluence of two major rivers in the Amazon Basin.
Our destination was the Napo Wildlife Center, located in the Yasuni National Park. This is an impressive eco-lodge that was constructed, and is maintained by a supply chain that includes a 2-hour human propelled canoe ride up a small tributary of the Napo River.
At Caco, we boarded a motor-canoe that we took downriver for two hours. The Napo River originates in the Andes and carries a massive amount of sediment, and has a rather swift current, that I reckon is about 2 knots, give-or-take. The river is fairly wide and quite shallow. I admired the skill of the pilots who navigated through the numerous sand bars along the way.
On the banks of the Napo, there were signs of the national oil industry - barges supporting oil exploration, oils wells and the like. Most of the Ecuadorians seemed keenly aware of the trade-offs of the economic boost of petrochemical exploitation against potential harm to the ecosystem.
View down the Napo River from the city of Coca.
The preparations for the Amazon basin included shots for Yellow Fever, a prophylactic round of anti-malaria drugs, plenty of deet, bug nets, and treated clothing. All of this conjured up images of massive suffering - super hot sticky weather, venomous critters of all kinds, parasites and the like. When I was young, I had a horrid experience with black flies in northern Quebec, and in the back of my mind, I was concerned about something similar, but perhaps even worse.
Nothing could be further from our experience - although it was humid, we had cloud cover most days, and the temperatures were moderate. There were few bugs or mosquitos, although we encountered some massive spiders from time-to-time.
After our motor canoe ride, we disembarked and got into one of three canoes for the two hour paddle up the tributary to the Napo Wildlife Center.
Canoe paddle to the Napo Wildlife Center
Crested heron on approach to the wildlife center.
Hoatzin or 'stinky turkey'.
We split into two groups of 7 for each of two canoes. Our canoes had guides: Luis and Delphin. During the paddle in, they pointed out many creatures - birds and monkeys. Although a seasoned Amazon basin traveler might view the experience as somewhat pedestrian, it was amazing for us, and well-suited to our large group.
Just after sunset on the first day, we reached the lodge, which was quite cushy, with excellent food, and even wifi service. Power is supplied by diesel generators, and, like everything else, fuel has to be transported via paddled canoes.
The next two days were various excursions around the Yasuni Park, with our guides. The wildlife guides were Quichua's, the largest indigenous group in Ecuador. Their skill in identifying animals was astonishing. I recall one time when they pointed to what seemed to be a dark patch in the trees, which turned out to be a sloth with her baby clinging to her stomach.
Lurking in the weeds near the Center was a huge anaconda that the guides reckon was in the 15-20 foot range. We stopped and looked at this huge beast coiled up, evidently digesting its most recent meal.
Capuchin monkey. They use their prehensile tail as a kind of fifth limb for maneuvering in the forest canopy.
The two groups took turns looking at birdlife in a platform high up in the forest canopy. Our group saw a magnificent sunset, and then walked and paddled in the dark back to the Center. On the way, we saw tons of bioluminescence, including fireflies and glow worms.
Sunset from the viewing platform.
The next day we visited two clay licks. Many of the birds have an adapted behavior that includes a trip to clay licks that have elevated amounts of metals, including sodium. Various hypotheses abound, including the idea that some metals allow them to produce gastric enzymes that allow them to tolerate bitter fruits.
First of two clay licks - this one frequented by parrots.
A surprise: an unusual appearance of a family of howler monkeys on the ground at the second clay lick.
A pootoo - native bird to the Amazon region that clearly has good camouflage going.
Macaws at the second clay lick. They had to wait for the howler monkey family to depart.
Cayman seen on the paddle back from the salt licks.
James and me playing music at our last evening at Napo.
After our two days at the Napo Center, we took the paddle canoes back and boarded the motor canoe to Coca. The water level on the Napo river had dropped significantly, and we bottomed out a few times, but by getting the passengers to redistribute their weight and rock the boat, we managed to make it through. Time was tight, be we caught our flight back to Quito.
Quito (18-20 Dec)
Natalie, our guide for most of the ground excursions in and around Quito, met us at the airport and accompanied us on the bus ride into the Old Town.
Ecuador has a fascinating history behind it from the pre-Inca times until the present. The reader can clearly look up their own history, as I am sure to mangle it, but I'll give my impressions. First, much infrastructure is quite new. The airport serving Quito was recently built and very well appointed. The system of highways is impressive, as they wind through precipitous canyons of the rivers sculpting the country around the capital. Because of the threat of earthquakes, the hillsides facing the highway are plastered with concrete to prevent rockslides.
According to Natalie, the country has run up substantial debt in updating their infrastructure, including two major hydroelectric power plants financed by the Chinese. Another piece of infrastructure underway is a new subway system in Quito, which is scheduled to come online in 2020.
The government is somewhat unstable, with a succession of presidents that have come and gone without finishing out their terms. In the fall of the past year (2019), there was a mass protest in the Old Town in front of the Presidential Palace, closing off streets in the capital.
At some point, there was a decision to go onto the US Dollar as the official currency. This was a conscious decision in the face of multiple severe instances of inflation, but closed off many of the export channels to the rest of South America.
From the airport, we were driven to the Hotel Patio Andaluz, in the heart of the Old Town of Quito, where we had the afternoon off. Being at 9350 ft above sea level, Quito vies for the title of the highest capital city in the world with Bolivia and Tibet, depending on how you count these. In any case, we definitely felt the effects of a quick transport from sea level at Napo to altitude. Some of us tried the cocoa tea available at the hotel, although it's not clear that it had any effect.
Some of us hiked up to La Compania de Jesus, the 16th century church situated high above the Old Town. Later, I had dinner at a restaurant/cafe along a street in Old Town called La Ronda.
The next day (Dec. 19th), we were back on the tour bus. We first took a cable car to a hillside high above Quito for a view of the entire city. With a population of 2.5 million, and hemmed in by mountains to the west and gorges to the east, it's expanding to the north and south. Charlotte flew in that morning from Santiago and joined us as our 15th.
On the bus ride from the airport, our guide, Natalie had mentioned an Equator Museum somewhat to the north of the city, and we asked to see it as part of the Quito portion of our holiday. After the cable car ride, we went there. It's a somewhat whimsical look at common misconceptions about phenomena associated with our existence on a spinning planet.
My favorite part of the museum, in fact, our stay in Quito, was Natalie trying to work her way through the Coriolis Effect. I've worked long and hard to derive cogent descriptions of the Coriolis Effect: what is is and isn't. I had to bite my tongue through Natalie's explanations. One fun demonstration was water draining out of a moveable sink. First Natalie took it to the physical equator, and drained it, noting that the water went straight down the drain-hole. Next, she took it about 10 feet south of the line, and noted that the water drained out clockwise. Then, she took it 10 feet south of the the line, and noted that it drained out counterclockwise. When I noted that she had given the water a gentle swirl inciting the rotations, she did not object.
Natalie, explaining the Coriolis Effect and water draining out of a tub to a credulous audience.
After the Equator Museum, we had lunch in a restaurant in the plaza opposite the Presidential Palace, and then a walking tour of the Old Town. On the way back to the hotel, we passed a protest against the detainment of opposition figures to the government in front of the Palace.
Rally for jailed political activists outside the Presidential Palace in the Old Town.
Galapagos (20-27 Dec)
The next day, we were transported back to the Quito Airport, and caught a plane for the Baltra Airport, one of the two serving the Galapagos Islands.
Route of our tour of the Galapagos Islands on the Anahi. The start and end was at the Baltra Airport on the north end of Santa Cruz Island.
Entry into the Galapagos is a bit like entering a new country, as the government of Ecuador has put numerous restrictions on entry, mainly for preservation. So, passports were duly presented and luggage was passed through screening.
Just out of the airport, we were met by our next guide, Galo. He's a native Galapagan from the Island of San Cristobal, and free-lances as a certified National Park Guide. We boarded a bus that transported us to a boat ferry that crosses a narrow canal connecting to the island of Santa Cruz. Baltra was the site of a US WWII naval base that was intended to guard approaches to the Panama Canal, and we could see the remains of buildings dotting the landscape on the bus ride. After crossing the canal, we caught another bus on Santa Cruz.
Descriptions of the Galapagos abound, but I'll give my impressions. The first immediate impression is the recent volcanic activity. I'll wager that 95% of the surface of the islands are either lava or volcanic ash, and the remaining 5% is just ground down ash and soil. The lower elevations are drier, and at higher elevations, the mix of plants changes from cacti to moisture loving vegetation, with grasses and trees dotting the landscape. According to Galo, the archipelago is astride a hot-spot on the Nazca plate, which is moving east and being subducted under the Andes.
The youngest island is Fernandina, which geologists put at at less than 1 million years old. Galo said that it was only 35,000 years old. Whatever the precise ages of the Galapagos Islands are, the remains of volcanic activity are a constant.
The next impression is not only the profusion of wildlife, but their fearlessness of humans. In the transfer off the bus from Baltro to the ferry across the channel, sea lions lazed about in the sun in the waiting line for humans. These two first impressions of volcanic activity and the profusion of fearless wildlife held throughout our stay.
Our first stop on Santa Cruz Island was a site for viewing the giant Galapagos Tortoise. These were all over the landscape, munching at the abundant grass dotting the uplands.
Tortoises on Santa Cruz Island
After the tortoise visit, we were guests at a Christmas Party held for a kind of extended family of the company running trips in the Galapagos, including the crew of the Anahi, the catamaran that took us around the islands. After the party, we took the bus down to Puerto Ayora, where the Anahi was anchored, and boarded. At midnight, the crew pulled the anchor and started the passage to Puerto Villamil on Isabela Island.
Anahi
The Anahi has a capacity for 16 passengers, and with 15 people in our group, we bought out the boat for ourselves, which had the distinct advantage that we could move as a coherent group for the duration of the tour of the islands. A typical day consisted of breakfast, followed by a zodiac (motorboat) ride to a region of interest, some tour on one of the islands, then lunch, and another tour. We had frequent opportunities to snorkel. This is fairly typical for the Galapagos experience, and we saw multiple vessels anchoring in the various harbors on our cruise. Now, it seems pedestrian to say "typical", as the Galapagos is anything but.
Most of our time was spent along the coast of Isabela Island. Our first stop was at Puerto Villamil, at the base of the Sierra Negra volano, a shield volcano typical of Isabela Island. We were bused up to the trailhead leading to the caldera of Sierra Negra, but it was hemmed in by clouds, so Galo took us to a lava tube with insides dotted with a strange kind of lichen that glowed silver and gold under the blaze of the headlamps and cell phones.
Sea lions lounging on benches at Puerto Villamil.
We snorkeled, visited a tortoise breeding center, and then had a beer on the beach before getting back on the Anahi.
Flamingos at Puerto Villamil, Isabela Island.
The next several days were visits to various anchorages along the west coast of Isabela Island and a brief visit to Fernandina Island, just off Isabela. I won't go through a day-by-day description, but give some highlights below.
Blue footed boobie and penguin.
Blue footed boobies, marine iguanas, a baby sea lion nursing with its mother.
Flightless cormorant drying its wings.
Pelican nest.
Galapagos penguins.
One evening we had a birthday celebration for Karen, another night there was an Xmas party - all were festive, and the vacation was, to some extent, an extended party. I think Karen felt well celebrated with friends and family surrounding. The crew of the Anahi were great hosts.
There was one amusing moment that stuck with me. Galo was a fantastic guide, and had lots of patience with us. On one anchorage off of Isabela, he took the zodiacs into a mangrove swamp, and we paddled quietly into small alcoves. I was in the second zodiac and couldn't hear everything Galo was saying, but as we closed in on his boat, I caught the tail end of a description, "It's over there, but it's camouflaged, so you can't see it." He was pointing out a sea turtle that had burrowed into the muck under the mangrove roots, but it wasn't immediately clear what "it" was to me, and if it was camouflaged, how could I see "it" in any case. The joking response of Jonathan was, "But what is camouflage?" I noted that this was more of an existential question, and the theme of "What is camouflage" stuck as a repeated inside joke throughout the voyage.
Galapagos flycatcher
On one shore excursion, Galo tried his best to point out many of the species of land-birds, including the famous mockingbirds and finches that inspired Darwin. The profusion of land-bird species was somewhat daunting to us, with small, medium, and large ground finches all around. Galo said that when he was young, he found the finches rather annoying, but now he somewhat understands the enthusiasm of foreign birders who bring in $7000 telephoto lenses to document their list of sightings.
Dolphins off Isabela Island
After four days on Isabela Island, we motored to Santiago Island, then visited Rabida, an island called the Chinese Hat, and then Bartholomew Island.
Phoebe, Karen, and Marion on Santiago Island.
Chinese Hat
Bartholmew Island. One of the scenes from the movie Master and Commander: the Far Side of the World was shot here. Astronaut Buzz Aldrin commented that the surface of Bartholmew looked like what he saw on the moon.
One of the highlights of the excursion in the Galapagos was snorkeling. In addition to the bright colored fish, like parrot fish, there were all manner of near encounters with sea life. Here, a group of penguins would zip by. Over there, a sea turtle would swim so close that I had to work to avoid touching it. In another moment, I was by myself, and a sea lion came out to play with me, like some kind of friendly and curious aquatic puppy. I also saw my first live octopus fending off aggressive fish from its lair.
Our final anchorage was off the Seymour Islands, near the Baltro Airport. On our last morning, we toured one of the Seymour Islands, seeing nests of magnificent frigate birds and blue footed boobies.
Then it was into the airport, and a flight back to Quito.
Hacienda Zuleta (27-30 Dec)
Again, Natalie met us as we got out of baggage claim, and we herded ourselves and baggage onto the bus, this time for a drive of about two hours to Hacienda Zuleta for the last leg of our vacation stint. This dates from the 17th century, and was recently the home of Ecuadorian President Galo Plaza Lasso and was converted into a resort hotel.
When we arrived, President Lasso's daughter, Margarita, was 'holding court' during the cocktail hour in the living room/entry, and when she saw my banjo and James' guitar, she asked for a concert, which we delivered on our last evening there.
Library at Hacienda Zuleta, with a portrait of Galo Plaza Lasso.
The food there was great, with many local specialities. The working farm had a cheese-making operation, with a signature brand called Don Galo, which is/was amazing.
The next day we toured a local site for breeding Andean Condors - a highly endangered species, of with only 150 are supposed to inhabit the Ecuadorean mountains. Locally, there was something of a treat. In addition to the caged condors, there were three wild condors soaring high above the valley.
Wild condor soaring above a valley near Hacienda Zuleta.
Phoebe, Maddie, and James walking toward the condor breeding center.
On our final full day, everyone took some kind of excursion - either a hike, or a horseback ride, or a cooking lesson. We had a local guide hired for the day, and he took James and me up a nearby...hill...er...mountain? The 'summit' was at 14,000 feet, but was completely covered in grass. It's strange for me to write about a 'hill' at 14,000 feet, and I definitely felt the altitude hiking up it, but there were families picnicking on the lakes dotting the hillside on Sunday outings - not something you'd think of when discussing 14,000 feet - well, at least in the US.
One of the guides told me of a set of navigation windows left by indigenous peoples from some time ago. These were stone 'frames' that were intended to guide people across the crest of the mountains. Unfortunately, I didn't have time for the 8-hour circuit, but I did think about a return visit, with some time to acclimatize and a tour of these curious structures.
We bumped into Maddie and Netta horseback riding on our hike.
View of Cayambe Volcano.
James and me on the summit of the 14,000 ft. 'hill'. The city of Angochagua, capital of the province of Imbabura, is visible in the distance.
I think some of us may have suffered from excursion fatigue by the end. Although I had opportunities to get out that last afternoon, I opted to practice the banjo in the outer courtyard of the Hacienda. The acoustics were magnificent, and there was a nice reverb effect from the sound bouncing off the stonework, including the cobblestones. That evening, James and I played some tunes for Margarita, who seemed to enjoy the mini-concert.
On our last day in Ecuador, we had a tour of the Hacienda grounds, including the cheese-making facility. After lunch, Natalie returned with the bus back to the Quito airport. We made a brief stop at an open market in the town of Otavalo for folks to stock up on last minute souvenirs.
Charlotte had to leave early on her Lima-to-Santiago flights, and then our crew slowly dispersed with late-night flights to all points in the US, scattered to the compass points and into the new year.
But, what *is* camouflage, anyway?
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