A Wonderful Beginning of the End

As my time left in Ecuador winds down to less than a week, I’m happy to say that I’ve been able to take full advantage of what I can do here. I do still have a class to focus some of my attention on until this Thursday, but I’m also able to go on snorkeling and scuba trips as well as a fishing trip for class. The last course of my study abroad program is entitled Human Ecology and Maritime Communities. It’s a very good wrap up course although it could also be a very good intro to the Galápagos course because we’ve been talking about the political issues, history, and ecology of the islands. We’ve been focusing on maritime issues such as the fishing industry and how detrimental it has become and the tourist industry. Because the number of tourists has increased so much over the past few years, Ecuadorians immigrated to the islands at an alarming rate until the government made a law to restrict the immigration. Moving to the Galápagos may give families an opportunity to earn money; however, only about 10% of the money that is made off of tourists coming here goes to the local community because many trips are on boats that only take people to uninhabited islands. This also allows tourists to keep the idea of the Galápagos that they have such as there are no people living on these islands even though there’s around 30,000 between San Cristóbal, Santa Cruz, Floreana, and Isabela. But enough of the history lesson… here is a picture of a clothesline on someone's roof.

As I may have mentioned before, Ecuador is a very Catholic country so when Earth Day and Good Friday fall on the same day, Good Friday is going to be observed and Earth Day will be pushed back a week. That is why my classmates and I took part in a clean-up dive this Thursday and not last Thursday. This dive was through the same dive shop that I received my certification through. We met at 8:30 that morning to gear up and head over to la Pedrial, the concrete dock where the sea lions like to play all of the time. We stayed around the dock, picking up trash on the bay floor and in the rocks. There were also a few members of the Ecuadorian Navy there to help pull up large objects such as sheets of metal and tires. As usual, there were a few sea lions around to play with. One hugged the Brittney’s scuba tank and somewhere playing with the rope of the flag that Kianee and Sara had. There was also a lot of cool stuff to see compared to the last time we dove at la Pedrial because the water was crystal clear. There were several sting rays, including one buried in the sand up to a point that I could only see its eyes, a sea anemone, a crab that buried himself upon discovery, and the usual suspects of damselfish, sergeant fish, and pencil slate urchins.

Friday was a really cultural night that included both a political rally and some jamming and fire tossing for the fun of it. Next Saturday, May 7th, all of Ecuador will be voting on the potential illegalization of bull fighting and some other questions. When I say all of Ecuador will be voting, I mean that literally. It is mandatory to vote in Ecuador and no alcohol is sold the night before or the day of the voting. No positions are being campaigned for, but the rally was still pro-Correa, the current president of Ecuador, and there was the incentive of going to the rally of playing bingo for household appliances. That at least explained why there was a truck driving around towards the end of the week shouting out announcements and displaying posters of Correa on these appliances. Walking through the rally was interesting because Danielle, Ellie, and I were noticeably the only non-Ecuadorians at la Concha. Between rounds of bingo there was a lot of salsa music. I don’t know how long the rally went on for, but at least until 2 in the morning when I went to bed. 

Just a short walk across town there was a younger crowd playing on their drums, flutes, and guitar to people performing with fire. Although some people were just having fun with the flames, others were actually very talented. There were just as many foreigners here as there generally are in any place during the weekend, but they were either staying at the hostel where the music was being played or had made friends with the Ecuadorians that were there. After the fire performance, there was a musician singing away on a little patio accompanied by drums, bass, and another guitar. I don’t know that much Latin American music, but what he was playing sounded great and I did really enjoy when he played “Light My Fire” by the Doors. The night was very relaxed and more enjoyable hanging out with locals instead of going to bars where the majority of the people are some form of foreigner. 

The next morning I had more fun fishing than I ever thought I could have. For my class we were supposed to go on a fishing trip to see how sustainable fishing is, to see what the work is like, and think of good alternatives to a life made up of fishing because of the overexploitations of the waters. Almost everyone in the group went on the trip and we split up into several boats. My boat really had a lot of fun and we were the only ones to take part in artisanal fishing. For artisanal fishing, you drop a weighted line down to 40m and bring the line up about a meter from the bottom. There is no rod involved so you pull the line in when you think you have something caught. I almost caught my own fish, but it swam away about a meter from the surface. The fisherman was kind enough to let me pull in a few fish on his line. We caught 2 bacalao (which is grouper in the Galápagos), 3 cabrilla, a barracuda, one larger silver fish, and 5 or 6 smaller striped fish. We had tried fishing with rods for a few minutes, but nothing was biting so we went further out towards Leon Dormido and fished around there. Some of us also jumped into the water at the end of the trip, which felt really wonderful after spending about 5 hours out there. We did have covering and calm waters, but it was still fairly hot despite the clouds. (The picture above is the fish we caught.)

During the fishing trip we were also boarded by the Galápagos National Park and a member of the Navy. They were checking permits, seeing who was on board, and potentially also looking for any illegal operations that might be going on but did not actually search the boat, just asked questions. I’m glad we saw the national park patrolling the waters because most of the time we hear how the park does not have enough resources to patrol the waters and there is great animosity between the park and fishermen because of their conflicting interests. During the trip we also caught 5 fish that we had to throw back. One of the species had a strange horn on its back and a strange mouth. The other species was pinkish with circular fins and some legs to walk on. It kind of looked like it came from Dr. Seuss.

I was hesitant once again to go diving because the trip was kind of expensive, but, as usual, it was also amazingly worth it. We started out at 8 in the morning and returned a little past 1. Of course, the first half hour or so was taken up by trying on equipment and making sure everyone had everything they needed. I went diving with Sara, Diego (my professor), and a visiting professor from Australia as well as a dive master. Some of the divers around here are nice enough to take pictures and videos and give them to you for free while others make you pay for those pictures. I wish I could have taken my own underwater cameras diving with me, but the dives were too deep and even if a dive is supposedly only going to 12m, it doesn’t mean you might wander lower as happened today. 

I don’t actually know how famous Leon Dormido (or Kicker Rock) is for diving, but it is probably the best site to dive from Cristóbal. Karahua, the wreck dive that we did as part of our certification, was also very diverse and different to go to. But at Leon Dormido you have the chance to see so much more. Once again the water was quite clear and calm. The current wasn’t even that strong around Leon Dormido, which rises around 300ft and currently has a lot of green on it from the rainy season that allows plants to flourish. Now that I think of it, there is probably better snorkeling and diving during the southern summer (it is technically fall here now) or garúa season because the upwellings of the Humboldt current would bring in more nutrients and sharks would probably come from all over to feed. As it is, we saw all 4 species of shark that are often spotted there, which means a hammerhead, black tip reef sharks, white tip reef sharks, and Galápagos sharks. A few minutes after we reached the bottom of the channel, which is around 18m, I looked up and saw at least 10 sharks swimming many meters above me. There were small black tip reefs that we could get pretty close to us but were afraid of us. There were also sea turtles, an eagle ray, and various types of fish including the cabrilla that we caught on Saturday. (This is a random picture of the Opuntia cactus flower.)

Our second dive was literally around the corner and after surfacing for 45 minutes and changing tanks, we went back down to about 15m/50ft and floated along the wall of the rock. We did see one big white tip reef shark at the beginning of that dive. There was also an octopus hiding in circle in the rock that urchins generally grow in. I’m sure that I’ve swum with octopi before, but this is the first time I’ve seen one in the wild. It stayed hiding and curled up in its nook, but it was still cool to see! There were also some turtles in the distance and cool fish. There are small bits of coral around the area and these fish that I thought were only black and orange but also have neon purple around their edges.

I have now been on 7 dives here in the Galápagos and that’s nothing compared to experienced divers that go on hundreds and thousands of dives. When I was speaking with the visiting professor from Australia (whose name is Sheila), she told me that diving gets easier each time, which is good because I still have slight panic attacks when I first get to the bottom. This time I actually had more weight on than normal and I didn’t even think about how much weight the tank must be. With all of those extra pounds, it really shows how we are not meant to swim around on the ocean floor. Not to mention the pain in your ears and all of the things that can possibly go wrong. Still, it’s a really amazing experience and I’ll definitely be getting my advanced certification and hopefully by dive master certification in the far future.

As I mentioned, we now have less than a week left on these islands and a week from today I will be back in the states. Going back to Quito is going to be enough of a shock with fast moving traffic, tall buildings, and mass amounts of people. I don’t want to think about the reverse culture shock that I will be dealing with in the states. Even the temperature is going to be different after not dealing with anything below 60 for quite awhile. That’s a guess, but it definitely doesn’t get cold here during this time of the year and I know temperatures at night are still chilly at home. As I keep mentioning, I am excited to see everyone at home and get the chance to truly share my experiences (and more pictures and videos) in person. Until I get to see everyone, I hope all is well and all of you are surviving the end of the semester!