Stop #5 on the Ecuador adventure was Isla San Cristobal. We had to take 2 boats (2 hours each) to get to Isla San Cristobal since there were no direct routings (it was a long day). We paid $250 for the 6 of us for both boats. Again, there were no points hotels, so we paid $159/night (includes breakfast) for 2 nights for a quadruple room. There were thousands of sea lions at the port to greet us.
We took a stroll around the town later that day and during this learned that sea lions will mimic your behavior (so when Eliza and Sawyer decided to run, guess what the sea lions decided to do?) Sawyer was scared to death and was convinced that they were out to get her.
Sawyer, running from the sea lion on the dock at Isla San Cristobal, Galapagos, Ecuador.
The next day, we took an all day snorkel tour out to Kicker Rock ("Leon Dormido") to see more underwater wildlife. We had wetsuits this time and the water was a bit cold for the kids (even colder than at Los Tuneles on Isla Isabela). They toughed it out for as long as they could...we had to swim quite a bit around and through the rocks out in the open ocean, so by the end of it, they were quite cold and tired, but we were proud of them. Comparing this to Los Tuneles on Isla Isabela is probably not fair since there seemed to be a much higher concentration of wildlife at Los Tuneles and it was much easier, but there certainly was plenty to see at Leon Dormido, it was just much deeper and you had to work much harder for it. I think this would be an amazing scuba site. We saw a bunch of sea turtles, and the wildlife on the cliffs was pretty cool...many different kinds of starfish and small fish. There were a couple bigger sharks around, but only those in the front caught any glimpse of them because they quickly swam away...we did manage to get a few pictures though.
Kicker Rock ("Leon Dormido")
Underwater video of 4 sea turtles at Leon Dormido.
There were thousands of fish about 15 feet below the surface. If you could swim down below them, a hole would open up and you could look back up through the hole. The fish were like a big black cloud.
Starfish on the cliff.
Another starfish on the cliff.
Sea turtles all over the place.
Eliza and Ryder, swimming through the channel at Leon Dormido.
A bigger shark in the water with us...it quickly swam away, but not before we could get a few pics. Neither Eliza nor the kids saw this or it may have been the end of the snorkeling for a while (although it wouldn't have mattered much since we were far from the boats at that time).
There were a few sea lions that came out to play with us. This was the highlight of Eliza's snorkel experience. She was able to swim within a few feet of a sea lion for 5-10 minutes as it circled her and went into and out of the water.
Our crew at Leon Dormido.
Eliza with a sea lion in the water with her at Leon Dormido.
After we finished our dive at Leon Dormido, we were taken to a beautiful beach for lunch and some downtime. The kids had a blast exploring the beach...they found skeletons of sea lions and some pretty unique sea shells.
The kids playing on the beach after our dive at Leon Dormido.
Lunch, back in town...empanadas.
Nash, playing on the beach after our snorkel at Leon Dormido.
Sawyer, stacking rocks on the beach.
Zander, playing in the sand.
Ryder, with the sea lion skull he found.
Kids exploring the beach.
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