The Pikaia Lodge is on Santa Cruz Island, which has a population of 23,000 out of the total in the Galapagos of 25,000. The lodge has 14 rooms and is the only hotel with its own yacht. In a six day stay guests have three full day navigations. On each trip we were in a group with 2-4 other guests and our guide, Mario. Due to the strict regulations there was never more than one other group on each island but generally we were the only group.
Our first trip was to North Seymour and Mosquera. The islands usually have two names; one Spanish and one English, either may be the official name. The English names have naval connections eg the English name for Santa Cruz is Indefatigable. South Seymour is officially named Baltra.
North Seymour has blue footed booby birds and great and magnificent frigate birds. Mario, our guide, told us that we were lucky to see the mating ceremony of the boobies, known as the booby dance.
The island hike was followed by snorkelling and a beach walk on Mosquera Islet to see sea lions. A feature of all the islands is the approachability of all the animals, birds and sea life as they have not needed to adapt to human behaviour.
Shilli-Fully Travels 