So what if this one can barely cut through the calmest of waves? It feels good to be back on a zodiac. And what do we care if the driver is scarcely an expert on shoe-lace tying, let alone wildlife? This is fun.
On board the Angelique, the cabins are small but comfortable, and come complete with some brilliantly fierce air conditioning. We've hardly got time to enjoy that, though, before we're being bundled off the boat again for our first activity – a quick tour of Bacchas Beach and the chance to go snorkelling for the first time. Unfortunately, the only animals anyone really cares about are the clouds of mosquitoes and the infinitely more-painful sand flies. (If you've never had the joy of meeting a sand fly, it has the tenacity of a Scottish midge and the sting of a wasp. In short, it is a right c**t.)
We wake the morning up having had a torrid night with the air conditioning. While some (Wee Mo) would blame it on my lack of common sense, I blame the fact that I tried to adjust it while half asleep and the remote was old and not very good...
We toss ourselves into the water to escape the winged fury and quickly find that the water here has been so churned by wind and rain that we may as well be swimming in porridge.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, I begin to reconsider the Curse.
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| Photo: Wee Mo |
In any case, despite the sweaty evening, our trip to Genovesa island is the first time we really feel Curse-free. This little spot in the north east of the territory is a teeming sea bird colony, home to red-footed and Nazca boobies, petrels, endemic owls and – the stars of the show – the frigate birds. It was their weird, two metre silhouettes we saw hanging over Puerto Ayora, but whereas they looked like eerie pterodactyls there, up close they are perhaps the most handsome birds on the islands.
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| Photo: Wee Mo |
Frigates are not true sea birds, instead they scavenge from the surface, or – more often – attack other birds in mid-air for their food or nest-building materials. The moment it has secured one of these, it is typically set upon by a number of its kin. So begins a game Quidditch where, unusually, I don't want all of the participants to die.
On the ground, they're no less interesting. As in the human world, it's mating season and amorous males are attempting to attract females with their colossal, red sacks. Unlike in the human world, they also do this:
Video: Wee Mo
Our afternoon activity is to be snorkelling again, and again it is ruined by fading light and torrential rain. Annoyingly, the moment we call it off, the weather clears up and we're treated to some exquisite light and a bonnie sunset.
The sun hasn't disappeared by morning, even though we're back south of the equator again, now moored just off the islands of Bartolome and Santiago. So far as the history of the world goes, the Galapagos are fairly young, born of lava spewing from the ocean floor. On these two islands, we're shown how the whole unimaginably violent process would have taken place. To paraphrase Darwin (who was either the most important person to ever visit the islands, or just another dude who said “wow”, depending on who you listen to) it's as though the ocean has been petrified in one of its most tumultuous moods.
Once again, this is followed by snorkelling and for the first time we get the chance to see what all the fuss is about. The sun has faded, but the water remains tremendously clear. Importantly, we also get lots of time to explore. Initially, this doesn't reveal much – and I'm not helped by the fact my mask is so scratched and clouded that I may as well have been given cataracts and a snorkel. But being engaged to the best person on the planet has its perks, and so Wee Mo gives up her mask and takes a break and leaves me to it. The change is like going from watching Channel 5 in the countryside to glorious HD in London town. Also, my Luck, hitherto absent, comes back to my side. So while everyone else is either having a rest or swimming elsewhere, I stumble into this tranquil motherfucker.
And a few moments, tranquillity deserts me altogether. Having let the ocean drift take me back around a corner and I decide to check the turtle video. Then I look up and see this.
The afternoon comes and we're taken to a lava field in the heaviest rain yet – a total washout. Pfft! What do I care? I stand, bare-chested and Lear-like in the pouring rain. I laugh at the Curse. Haha!
Sanity restored, we journey back to Santa Cruz to learn about perhaps the Galapagos' most famous inhabitants, the giant tortoises. These poor bastards are only just recovering from the initial devastation mankind brought with him. Pirates quickly worked out that the the tortoises were A) tasty and B) could survive for an entire year on their backs beneath the Jolly Roger without needing any food or water.
The tortoises also had to deal with introduced species including such pleasures as feral dogs, rats and bastard cats, which called a truce between in each other to focus on slaughtering the locals. Thanks, man!
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| Photo: Wee Mo |
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| Photo: Wee Mo |
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| Photo: Wee Mo |
The fourth day on the boat is also a day of change. Our guide is leaving to take his first holiday in four months and is replaced by a gormless stoner for whom communication in any language seems a challenge. We also lose our two Argentinians and have them replaced by four Irish girls with skin white like paper, two affable Canadian teenagers and two giant (one horizontally, one vertically) Americans.
Though ultimately we have the least to do with this final couple, they do provide the most immediate entertainment, specifically when the tall man left a dump of such vast, vile proportions that it was deemed unflushable by the boat's feeble sewage system. On discovering the beast lying in the shadows, his wide partner immediately vomited, only breaking from the chundering to admonish her partner's devastating sphincter. He, a qualified doctor, simply replied “Well it's better out than in.” I suppose he would know.
Though ultimately we have the least to do with this final couple, they do provide the most immediate entertainment, specifically when the tall man left a dump of such vast, vile proportions that it was deemed unflushable by the boat's feeble sewage system. On discovering the beast lying in the shadows, his wide partner immediately vomited, only breaking from the chundering to admonish her partner's devastating sphincter. He, a qualified doctor, simply replied “Well it's better out than in.” I suppose he would know.
That night, having been at sea for an entire four days, the crew decide to reward themselves with a night out in Puerto Ayora. Despite being a rag-tag gang of ruddy-faced, fat-fingered rascals, no one really grudges them their shore leave.
Instead, the majority of us stay on board, drink a little ourselves, talk a sizeable ream of shit, and go to bed. Tonight we sail to Floreana, the first of the southern islands.
But then, some time around 3am, the air conditioning dies and the boat becomes unbearably hot. People become agitated. Something is amiss.