.... volcanos and craters and such ...

when we flew into the galapagos islands, we landed on baltra ... baltra used to be called south seymour (remember that, one of the coolest islands is north seymour) .... in the early 20th century the united states military built an airport and military base on south seymour and it was renamed baltra ... baltra is flat because it is a geological uplift ... from tectonic plates shifting ... as opposed to the islands that are mountainous or full of craters because of volcanic formation ....  in the early days of the airport, all of the endemic animals on it became extinct ... dogs, goats, rats and bored soldiers with guns were to blame

.... prior to extinction one soldier with an environmentalist/naturalist leaning (in the 30s) took about 20 giant land iguanas to north seymour to protect them .... he saved them from extinction ... 

when we left baltra on our ferry, we crossed the VERY narrow itabaca channel to santa cruz .... santa cruz is the second largest island in the galapagos and most populated ... isabella is largest, far to the west, and we did not go there .... santa cruz is a dormant volcano ... thank goodness for dormant, huh?

here is my traveling family on our first day, straight from the airport ... or straight by plane, bus, ferry, van.....standing next to los gemelos ... a giant crater that is now lush and green and alternately rocky .... it is a collapsed magma chamber ... inside the earth there was a giant bubble of magma (lava) and the bubble essentially popped, leaving a crater, a bowl, a hole, a tourist spot along the road .... it is stunningly big ... and leaves you very aware that you are in volcano land .... luckily, scientists think the last time it erupted was about a million years ago ... seriously, a million years .... that's a long time ....

 so this los gemelos means the twins ... there are two of them ... the street cuts right between them .... you go see one pit crater and then cross the street and see its partner .... one is impressive... two though? doubly so ....

after our crater visit, we went to a much needed lunch at a farmhouse restaurant .... they set up a buffet just for my family and dora .... chicken and fish and potatos and vegetables and all sorts of stuff .... i can't remember the exact name of the restaurant ... ariella? it meant witch's hat .... here's where you can tell that my travel journaling at the end of each day was done under the cloud of exhaustion! none of us could remember the name of where we had lunch!

from lunch? off to the giant tortoise reserve ....

more about that tomorrow ....