Bartholome

For the last day of the holiday, rather than relaxing and packing, I decided to sign up for a trip to the most photographed place in the Galapagos Islands. A day trip (leaving at 5am) to Bartholome Island. A small island just off Santiago. The famous site there is 'Pinnacle Rock' which juts out the side at a very strange angle.

We were picked up at 5.25am (after having waited 25 minutes) and driven across the islands to the harbour at the north and boarded our boat there. After breakfast we sat up on the deck for the 2 and a half our trip to Bartholome. Luckily this boat wasn't a speed boat crasing against the waves, but a gentle put-putter! Bartholome was actually right next to Cousins Rock where I had been diving 2 days earlier and it had taken an hour less to get there! But we sunbathed and finished off our nights sleep on the way.

We arrived and climbed the Volcano on Bartholome (not too high) to one of the most amazing views there are. The guide pointed out that there was one beach (with Pinnacle Rock) for people to swim, snorkel etc and the other one was for turtles! It was protected and people were not allowed there.

After taking a mountain of photographs we went back down the volcano and round to the beach to snorkel. I felt quite brave and swam out round the rock and to the lagoon type area where there were supposed to be penguins. We found one penguin busy cleaning his feathers and swam up closer. He didn't flinch and just carried on with what he was doing. We got closer and ended up close enough to reach out and touch him and he still didn't bother with us.

We came back round the beach and waited for the small boat to take us to our bigger boat. As we were waiting, most other groups had left and we ended up being some of only a few people on the beach. When the bay is quiet, the penguins and sea lions come round to swim, play and fish. We were standing knee deep in the water and they were swimming all around us. It was truly amazing. We caught our boat, went back to to the bigger boat for lunch and slowly made our way home.

An amazing finish to an amazing holiday. Probably the best of my life so far!

The view from the Volcano. And Pinnacle Rock.

Last day diving.

I decided to go for one more days diving with the company I had done my PADI with (Scuba Iguana) and headed to a different place. We went to Cousins Rock and then round to Beagle Rock. The dives were amazing. I was still quite nervous, there were still others who kept swimming underneath me which is very unnerving as a new diver. But we saw some pretty amazing stuff. The first dive we saw a lot in the reef - a seahorse, moray eel, octopus, clam, sea cucumber, a few reef sharks. But the second dive was probably my best so far. I was feeling more confident and was relatively calm and we saw Hammerhead sharks. Which made me a little nervous again.... We were on a reef, kind of hanging onto the rocks and looking out into 'the blue' although not very far as the visibility wasn't so good. People had said there were Hammerheads, but I had spent a few other dives watching people swim quickly through the visibility until I couldn't see their flippers and then come back telling me that there was a hammer head. It is quite a surreal experience to see someone swimming back towards you after feeling stranded and a little scared, looking excited and banging their clenched fists at either side of their heads (the signal for hammerheads). So I knew, or at least thought they were there.

It didn't quite prepare me for seeing one, then another, then another swim past. There were about 7 or 8 of them, and they must have been about 10ft long. They came round in front of us a few times. They were only about 5 or 6 metres away and you could see their eyes. They swam past not looking interested, but they knew we were there, and could probably hear my heart hammering in my chest. We spent the last 10 minutes or so of the dive in the middle of thousands of fish. Lots of different types, including lots of Baracuda seemed to congregate around us! Diving has to be one of the most amazing things I have ever tried. And one I think I will be doing again.

a seahorse a Sarah Paddick a White-tipped Reef Shark