Live: Nov 18 2023 Xpedition Galapagos Southern Loop

[LMADAMS91]

21 hours ago, mahdnc said:

If you are thinking of limiting yourself to doing snorkeling just a couple of times, it is worth talking to the naturalists and they can give you an idea of what you are likely to see and at which locations.

 

Oh, I doubt we will be limiting our snorkeling time, unless the water is just too cold. Both my husband and I are pretty cold-natured and I hate getting in cold water, even with a wet suit.  Our son and future daughter-in-law did a Galapagos cruise in January and loved the snorkeling. They had sea lions and penguins swimming close enough to touch. Said they saw tons of turtles and several sharks. 

[mahdnc]

11 minutes ago, LMADAMS91 said:

Oh, I doubt we will be limiting our snorkeling time, unless the water is just too cold. Both my husband and I are pretty cold-natured and I hate getting in cold water, even with a wet suit.  Our son and future daughter-in-law did a Galapagos cruise in January and loved the snorkeling. They had sea lions and penguins swimming close enough to touch. Said they saw tons of turtles and several sharks. 

 

Then you will have a fine time snorkeling at the Galapagos!!  We saw all of the above and we saw a few rays including some spotted eagle rays.  That is pretty cool, too.

[sandiego1]

8 hours ago, LMADAMS91 said:

Oh, I doubt we will be limiting our snorkeling time, unless the water is just too cold. Both my husband and I are pretty cold-natured and I hate getting in cold water, even with a wet suit.  Our son and future daughter-in-law did a Galapagos cruise in January and loved the snorkeling. They had sea lions and penguins swimming close enough to touch. Said they saw tons of turtles and several sharks. 

I bought a pair of swim pants on Amazon. I wore that plus a long sleeve rash guard under the shortie wetsuit. The water was shockingly cold at first. I got used to it. I  am always cold in the water but this worked well for me.

[mahdnc]

1 hour ago, sandiego1 said:

I bought a pair of swim pants on Amazon. I wore that plus a long sleeve rash guard under the shortie wetsuit. The water was shockingly cold at first. I got used to it. I  am always cold in the water but this worked well for me.

Were you affected by the recent events in Ecuador?

Edited March 4 by mahdnc

[sandiego1]

Just now, mahdnc said:

We’re you affected by the recent current events in Ecuador?

That’s why half the ship cancelled. Cuenca was 100% safe. I walked around by myself several times while my husband and friends played pickleball.

 

Before we left the US, we rebooked the hotel in Guayaquil for the night before our flight to Baltra. Instead of staying 15-20 min from the airport, we stayed at the Holiday Inn right at the airport. We ate dinner in the hotel restaurant. Lots of security the airport and hotel.

 

We hired a driver and guide for 2 days in Quito and were fine walking around with them. We went to several tourist sites in Quito including El Mitdad del Mindo and Intinam Museum, plus the Mindo Cloud Forest and several sites near there.
 

On the 3rd full day, we just relaxed in the hotel lounge. We decided to go out to dinner at a restaurant in a mall that was only 1/2 mile away. We were told it wasn’t safe for us to walk and were advised to only use the hotel car service. At $4 each way, it was worth it to be safe.

[mahdnc]

8 hours ago, sandiego1 said:

That’s why half the ship cancelled. Cuenca was 100% safe. I walked around by myself several times while my husband and friends played pickleball.

 

Before we left the US, we rebooked the hotel in Guayaquil for the night before our flight to Baltra. Instead of staying 15-20 min from the airport, we stayed at the Holiday Inn right at the airport. We ate dinner in the hotel restaurant. Lots of security the airport and hotel.

 

We hired a driver and guide for 2 days in Quito and were fine walking around with them. We went to several tourist sites in Quito including El Mitdad del Mindo and Intinam Museum, plus the Mindo Cloud Forest and several sites near there.
 

On the 3rd full day, we just relaxed in the hotel lounge. We decided to go out to dinner at a restaurant in a mall that was only 1/2 mile away. We were told it wasn’t safe for us to walk and were advised to only use the hotel car service. At $4 each way, it was worth it to be safe.

 

I guess I should have put two and two together regarding the half full ship.  It sounds like you did the sailing "cruise only".  Were there many passengers on board who purchased on of the 10 or11 night packages?  I can't imagine Celebrity was running their full Quito tours back then.

[sandiego1]

1 hour ago, mahdnc said:

 

I guess I should have put two and two together regarding the half full ship.  It sounds like you did the sailing "cruise only".  Were there many passengers on board who purchased on of the 10 or11 night packages?  I can't imagine Celebrity was running their full Quito tours back then.

Yes, we did cruise only. Several others did the package and got $ back since they just did the cruise portion. The rest cancelled.

[mahdnc]

Last month, Celebrity published a Galapagos Shore Excursions Flyer that was written specifically for Flora.  However for the places in the brochure that we visited during our Xpedition sailing, the information seem to apply.  Here is the link.

[Gardenbunny50]

This is fantastic.  Thank you so much.  I had made notes from print out they gave me onboard when we booked but this is more detail.  And a couple extra events not on the print out.  We leave from Miami May 10 to Quito.  So excited to experience this magical place.

[mahdnc]

22 hours ago, Gardenbunny50 said:

This is fantastic.  Thank you so much.  I had made notes from print out they gave me onboard when we booked but this is more detail.  And a couple extra events not on the print out.  We leave from Miami May 10 to Quito.  So excited to experience this magical place.

 

Have fun on your trip, I know you will enjoy it.  Celebrity does an excellent job.

 

David

[Beachlover1989]

On 3/3/2024 at 11:57 PM, sandiego1 said:

We hired a driver and guide for 2 days in Quito and were fine walking around with them. We went to several tourist sites in Quito including El Mitdad del Mindo and Intinam Museum, plus the Mindo Cloud Forest and several sites near there.
 

 

How did you go about hiring a driver and guide?  Do you have contact information? We're looking for a guide who's willing to just play it be ear with us and see what we want and for how long.

[sandiego1]

4 hours ago, Beachlover1989 said:

How did you go about hiring a driver and guide?  Do you have contact information? We're looking for a guide who's willing to just play it be ear with us and see what we want and for how long.

We hired Elizabeth B through ToursByLocals.

[mahdnc]

We took a small trip to southern Illinois to watch and photograph last week's spectacular total solar eclipse.  It was the 3rd total solar eclipse for my wife and me. 

 

click/tap on the images to make them larger

 

click/tap on the images to make them larger

 

I took a look at the solar eclipses in the future to see if there were any that would visit the Galapagos Islands.  Well it turns out that the Galapagos will see a solar eclipse on Wed Jan 26 2028!

 

The bad news is that it will not be a total eclipse where the moon fully covers the sun--like the one last week. Instead it will be an annular eclipse where the moon goes completely in front of the sun, but the moon's disc will be too small to cover all of the sun.  This results in the dark moon's disc being surrounded by a ring of bright light (link to image). The internet and the press like to sensationalize this by call it a "ring of fire" (astronomers do not refer it that way).

 

The good news is that the eclipse will be underway when the sun rises at the Galapagos.  At maximum eclipse, the sun will only be 17 degrees above the horizon (at 7:25 am) which will make for awesome photos of this "ring of fire" with spectacular foreground opportunities and vivid morning colors.  Being low on the horizon also means that the sun will not be as intensely bright or hot which is another good thing (you will still need to wear some type of eye protection to directly look at an annular eclipse however).

 

The above diagram is reproduced with permission from "Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA's GSFC".

Edited April 15 by mahdnc

[sandiego1]

@mahdnc fabulous photos!! Thanks for sharing them.