Tip Top III – 8 Days B

Friday, Day 1

Flight from mainland Ecuador (Quito or Guayaquil) to Baltra, with TAME Airlines; arriving at 11:00 a.m. approximately. A guide meets us and accompanies us as we ride the bus to the Itabaca Channel, we cross the channel by barge and then we continue to Puerto Ayora by bus. We board the Yacht and the crew greets us and offers us a light snack and we have our first orientation. In the afternoon, we land at the pier for a visit to the Charles Darwin Station and its Interpretive Center. Return to the Port for a walk through the little town to appreciate various handicrafts. We have a welcome cocktail with the entire crew, and dinner.

Saturday, Day 2

After breakfast, we make a wet landing on Santa Fe Island to visit the cactus forest and a colony of land iguanas native from Santa Fe.

Optional: time for those who would like to swim, snorkel and/or kayak. Return to the Yacht for lunch and sail to South Plaza, where we make a dry landing on the pier of the island, there we can enjoy the antics of the sea lions. A walk through a cactus forest allows us to observe land iguanas and many species of tropical birds. At the end of the afternoon, we return to the Yacht for a delicious dinner and our nightly orientation.

Sunday, Day 3

After breakfast, we make a wet landing on Chinese Hat (Sombrero Chino), a small island off the Coast of Santiago Island, we can observe on the rocky shoreline: Galapagos penguins, eagle rays, sea lions and marine iguanas. This is an excellent snorkeling site.

Optional: time for those who would like to swim, snorkel and/ or kayak. We return to the boat for a delicious lunch. After lunch, we make a wet landing on Rábida, to walk and observe marine iguanas and sea lions, pelicans, bluefooted boobies, masked boobies and brown pelicans. We walk and we arrive at a small saltwater lagoon where we can see pink flamingos.

Optional: time for those who would like to swim, snorkel and/ or Kayak. Return to the Yacht for dinner and our nightly orientation.

Monday, Day 4

After breakfast we make a panga ride on Black Turtle Cove, series of mangrove-surrounded coves and islets; where we can observe white-tipped sharks, marine turtles, spotted eagle rays, and yellow cow-nosed rays. We return to the boat for a delicious lunch. Later in the afternoon, we make a dry landing on Dragon Hill, where we can see land iguanas; we walk to a hypersalinic lagoon (saltier than the ocean), where we can observe flamingos, common stilts, pintail ducks and other species of birds.

Optional: time for those who would like to swim and/or snorkel. We return to the Yacht for dinner and our nightly orientation.

Tuesday, Day 5

After breakfast, we make a wet landing on Post Office Bay, a historic site that recalls the days of the whalers, who presumably placed a wooden barrel in the 18th century to use it as a post office.

Optional: time for those who would like to swim and/or snorkel. Then, we make a panga ride on La Lobería of Post Office, where we can observe sea lion rookeries (the main attraction) on the beach and in the bay of the Lobería, sea turtles and marine iguanas. Return to the Yacht for lunch. In the afternoon, we visit the Devil’s Crown, a submerged volcano, for snorkelling for those who wish it (this is one of the best snorkelling sites in the Islands), then we make a wet landing on Point Cormorant for a short walk to the Flamingo Lagoon of this island. We then continue the walk until we reach the beach called “La Picona” to see marine turtles and their spawning grounds.

Optional: time for those who would like to swim and/or snorkel. We return to the Yacht for dinner and our nightly orientation.

Wednesday, Day 6

After breakfast, we make an early dry landing on Punta Suarez to walk along lava beds where we will observe unique colonies of marine birds, including Albatross (May – December). Return to the Yacht for lunch. In the afternoon, we make a wet landing in Gardner Bay for a walk on the beach and observe a colony of sea lions, which inhabit the beach in great quantity during the breeding season; this is also an important nesting area for sea turtles. Then we make a panga ride around the Osborn Islet and the islets of Gardner.

Optional: time for those who would like to swim and/or snorkel. Return to the Yacht for dinner and our nightly orientation.

Thursday, Day 7

After breakfast, we make a dry landing on the Interpretation Center of San Cristobal, this tour take us through the geological and human history of the islands, natural history and conservation. We come aboard for a delicious lunch. Later in the afternoon, our experienced Captain sails easily around Kicker Rock (León Dormido), a massive tuff-rock that juts abruptly almost 500 feet straight from the ocean. Kicker Rock serves as nesting place for many sea birds.

Optional: time for those who would like to swim and/ or snorkel. Then we make a wet landing on Cerro Brujo to walk on a white sand beach and observe sea lions, brown pelicans, marine iguanas and blue-footed boobies.

Optional: time for those who would like to swim, snorkel and/ or kayak. We return to the Yacht for dinner and our nightly orientation.

Friday, Day 8

After breakfast we make an early dry landing for a walk along the coast and the interior of North Seymour Island, a low, flat island that was uplifted from the sea by underground seismic activity. We observe blue footed boobies (they nest from May to November), marine iguanas, pelicans, frigate birds, shore birds, sea lions and endemic Palo Santo. We return to the Yacht for disembarking on the pier at 09:00. Your guide accompanies you on the bus ride directly to the airport.

Departure	Arrival