Southern Exposure

Tuesday, January 27

We had one final stop in the Galapagos before being taken to Baltra to the airport. We were stopping at Las Bachas, to see more flamingos. It was another wet beach landing and once ashore, we walked the short distance to the tiny brackish pond. No flamingos. This made for a fairly disappointing final stop for the only animals around were a few iguanas and the ever present crabs.

Since we were going directly from here to the airport dropoff, there was no time for snorkeling or swimming. We wandered up and down the beach, admittedly a bit bored, but soaking our final Galapagos moments and taking our last pictures. As we were boarding the dinghy to go back to the boat, I did manage to finally see a marine iguana swimming – I had missed the one Inna saw.

We spent our last 40 minutes of boat transit packing up. We arrived at the dropoff for Baltra, and took our last dinghy ride ashore with our bags. It was a short bus ride to the airport, and we were there a few hours early. We killed time looking at the souvenir shops clustered out front and then had a quick snack in the cafe before boarding.

The flight back was uneventful and a bit sad. The Galapagos had been an incredible experience, and we are so glad we seized the opportunity to visit while we were so nearby. Even with all of the strict rules about where you can and can’t go on the island, it was magical and is surely one of the jewels of this journey. It was also a nice vacation from our trip because we were in the same bed every night, there was no bike maintenance, and we had three good meals a day without having to go searching for them.

Once we landed in Quito, we took a cab back to our travel agent’s house, where her elderly father let us in. We repacked our bikes and put on all of our riding gear, which was quite different than our previous four days’ attire of swimsuit and t-shirt. We rode to a new hostel that Brian had recommended, the Travellers Inn, and they had a room for us. The parking was much easier than Casa Helbling and the rooms much nicer. It was a good upgrade and we owe Brian for that tip.

We went out for a pizza dinner, which despite being cooked in a wood burning oven, was not that great and overpriced to boot. At least the salads were huge and tasty. We went back to the hostal for some rest, and Inna could still feel the bed rocking as she fell asleep.