Un milagro llamado Galápagos II

For: Daniel Landa (Text) D.Landa / Sonia Garcia (Photos)
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We spent three hours crammed into a boat with life jackets and sweat banishing all fantasy of sailing across the Pacific. The smell of gasoline actually included dancing collars and causing a fast boat on the waves

That was the price for visiting San Cristobal, one of the most attractive Galapagos Islands.

In port, the sea lions were missing only applaud our arrival. They were everywhere, on the cover of some boats, Pier on the stairs, among the rocks of the coast or purring on the beach in Puerto Baquerizo Moreno. Tourists were disembarking with the same idiotic face, pointing to "seals" without knowing they were not wolves, which are marinos-, in any case stunned by the trip and the sun of a city that seems to smile, all of it, among the flowers of trees and restaurants overlooking the sea.

The breakfast Galapagan completed welcome. The tacacho is a mass of banana, with cheese and sausage, normally accompanied by a couple of fried eggs, coffee and fruit juice ... The whole island with birds and flowers seemed lighter than that breakfast. But once satiated he was ready to tour San Cristobal.

We spent three hours crammed into a boat with life jackets and sweat banishing all fantasy of sailing across the Pacific.

On the island there is only one place freshwater, a lake formed inside a small crater that locals have dubbed El Junco. There you can watch the dance epilepticus frigates. These birds fly to the lake every day to rinse off the salt. Rozan water and stirred in the air in a sort of aerial ritual, where males, also, display their red breast, if females are seduced by nervous flight, as spasms chopped, and get and get more out of this trip.

The island also has its galapaguera, its small prehistoric Eden huge turtles to which we must give way on their way to nowhere. And it has coves of blue water, far apart, far from men not to popularize its splendor. Puerto Chino Island just. This beach is accessed through wooded paths where you can watch the sea lion nap tired of so much sun.

But to understand the emergence of life, the overwhelming experience of wild contact, You must return to the sea. We hired a tour with a group of smiling Ecuadorians. The new boat was much friendlier than brought from Santa Cruz. We traveled to the rhythm of the breeze of a calm sea, oteando the green shores of San Cristobal, moving away a little and conquering islands that seem ignotas. So lonely were those new beaches I had to resist the urge to plant a flag. And there we snorkel with sea turtles company, they just looked at us, just they saw us, so clumsy humans in that world of corals and colorful fish. I even got to dive with an iguana who descended from a stone watchtower to dive into the sea, so ugly, so static out there and, suddenly, contorneándose seemed a siren in front of me, underwater.

To understand the emergence of life, the overwhelming experience of wild contact, You must return to the sea.

Our boat reached the Kicker, an island to be observed below. I adjusted the diving suit aware that for several years he did not, that here the currents are particularly strong and the idea was to get into the habitat of sharks. I reassured Charly, el monitor local. He spoke while immersing myself fear was overtaken by fear to continue listening, so only concern I felt a great relief as we descended to 18 meters underwater.

I had almost forgotten that feeling of diving among schools of fish, see octopuses that change color and Charly pointed me so enthusiastically that I even thought I heard a bubbling whisper behind his breather.

I saw many things down there, as in a fable. I think that diving is diving into a dream, everything is a lie, it is not possible such coordination algae and fish that do not touch, barracuda and anemones, of iridescent fins and silence, everything at once, as a marina owned.

He spoke while immersing myself fear was overtaken by fear to continue listening, so only concern I felt a great relief as we descended to 18 meters

Then I saw a cloud over my head, so black that I felt that we went into a cave under the sea. But Charly asked me calm. We stopped and we gaze upward course bubbles. These bubbles crossed the cloud and opened a hole of light in the darkness. Then I realized that, that black spot was a school of thousands of fish. A giant school of Salema, a silver fish, a species whose individuals do not exist without the other, they all move at a time when I myself adentré me on the bench, You fish away at once, creating a cylinder for which I was diving deep, and he could almost touch the wall of bright salemas, oneiric image that was born my fish, goofy smiling cheerful sireno between fish marabunta.

And this morning I saw more things.

I saw a sea lion pranced around a turtle and saw sharks swimming in a circle up there, like vultures on a ground dominating, as if they had detected a dam, as if that was us prey. And in that moment I thought the water was too cold.

I could almost touch the wall of bright salemas, oneiric image that was born my fish, goofy smiling cheerful sireno between fish marabunta.

This is home to dozens of hammerhead sharks but just did not see hammers. Perhaps to have a reason to return.

And ground fish still saw around me as he sipped the umpteenth papaya smoothie. Evening fell on his back on the colony of sea lions. Beach Puerto Baquerizo Moreno was full of wolves, sleepily each other, fur pillows and salt for the rest of the night.

In the nearby beaches man you can see sunset along these mammals, with that endemic naturalness of these islands, where for once we are not the predator.

Before the churning rush into conversation with a local guide. I told him about the strangeness of everything he had seen. "The real miracle of Galapagos said- It is that only two percent of the territory has been invaded by man. The rest belongs to its rightful owners. "

I was watching the sea lions stretched in the sand. And I had the feeling that one of them raised his fin slowly as a farewell.

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