Isla Isabella and the cost of living in the Galapagos

Up early to catch the 7 am boat to Isla Isabela. Paid $60.00 for the two of us to enjoy a bone jarring 2 1/2 hour boat ride. Priceless! Our hotel owner Leonela booked us in at her friends hostal including a taxi from the pier. On boat trip over I sat beside a friendly German woman touring with a group of 12. She paid $4000.00 Euros for 18 days, yowtch! Yet travelling alone I could see how this was safe while seeing the sights. I asked many questions and she had many answers in her perfect English. Yea! She informed me that when the president came to power he was popular and the citizens had high hopes. However like many places around the world corruption reared it's ugly head! Also, if it wasn't for the tourist dollars research done by scientists wouldn't exist! The average Ecuadorian's wage is $600 to $800 us dollars per month. In the Galapagos we're hoping it's more as the cost of goods are so expensive except for the local hard liquor made from sugar and costing a couple dollars per liter contributing to the usual problems associated with alcoholism.  Even the locals wear 100 SPF and that comes at a cost of close to $30 us for a small 200 ml bottle. One day while in a local store a woman in front of me bought  2 pairs of simple shoes, underwear, socks, 1 dress shirt, a polyester tie, and slacks (school uniform), her bill came to $145 us. Yikes! At home we could get that at Walmart for half the cost and Canadian dollars. Please slap me the next time I complain about the cost of living in Canada! It's good to travel and get some perspective on how others live.

After checking into our fan only room we joined another couple, a dad and his daughter to see the pink flamingo's and tortoise reserve. Cool stuff! Parts of Isla Isabela is very dry and barren full of massive lava boulders and previously hardened flows. Very desolate looking like some kind of surreal moonscape. The island does have 8 volcanoes with some still active. Later the taxi driver took us to his friends house for lunch. We walked through her home based beauty salon, sat at the kitchen table, and was served a tasty meal of fish, rice, fried plantains, ceviche, and a large pitcher of cold ice tea all for $7.00 each! Super deal and super delicious! And without being able to carry on a normal conversation we found out that the father and daughter touring with us were from a province close to Peru! They we so cute! Later we went to the beach and saw some boobies, couldn't see their feet so was not sure if they were blue footed or red. Another big group of 20 twenty year old boys ran to the beach yelling boobies and scared them away! Again stupid touristas! Fortunately the penguins didn't care and stayed on the lava rocks and posed for us. Later they joined us for a swim. OMG I LOVE them! They are about 18 inches in height and a 1000 times adorable!

Back in our hot loud fan only room we're treated to a squadron of mosquitoes. Plus my old Blaine back is starting to feel the effects of our bronco bustin boat trip. Having seen enough we decide to cut our losses and get out of Dodge! By the way except for the delightful lunch the majority of food here is overpriced crap. Where are those Italian chefs and euro standards when you need them. LOL!

Woke up to numbing in my legs from the previous boat ride so found a pharmacia and bought some heavy duty pain pills! Grabbed a bench seat at the back of the boat and with a beer the trip back was tolerable. Arggghh!