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Cruise Ship Tours vs. Come to Galapagos Land Based Tours and Travel |
Below is a letter written by one of our guests in
2011. I think it fairly succinctly details the
differences between land based and cruise tours of
the Galapagos. It can also be seen on trip adviser,
Click Here.
Galapagos Vacations with Come to Galapagos
land based private tours versus cruise tours. |
We had a long debate about whether to take a cruise
or land based tour for our Galapagos family
vacation. None of us really had the slightest idea
of what we were talking about, excepting maybe Shea,
my fourteen year old daughter, who didn’t really
either. She forms conclusions and strong beliefs
based solely on information she finds on the
internet. “Finds” is not actually the right word,
digs up, garners in the late night when she’s
suppose to be sleeping is more accurate. She would
“track down leads”, her words about Galapagos
Vacation web sites, “nice website, but who owns the
company, what is their history, track record, what
kind of reviews have they received and from whom?”
She asked several companies for referrals that she
could contact directly.
As a group we enthusiastically embraced the idea of
doing both kinds of tours, one week on a cruise tour
and one week with a locally owned and operated land
based Tour Company. Shea had found several companies
offering land based tours, but only one that was
owned and operated by a resident of the Galapagos.
This company also had credentials in the US, aside
from an address and bank account they also had a
state of California issued “California Seller of
Travel” license which they had had for more than
five years without complaints.
The cruise ships as best as Shea’s dangerously (I’m
her overly protective father) sophisticated Google
skills and detective/militant mind set could
determine seemed to be owned by foreigners or
investors, which she found offensive. I didn’t so
much as we were just trying to plan a nice Galapagos
family vacation. Here’s a challenge for anyone,
compete with my daughter, find a commercial interest
somewhere and dig/google whatever she does to come
up with who actually owns it, not just who operates
it as an owner at the behest of investors. She
informed my wife, myself and her younger brother
that most of the companies involved in cruise tours
in the Galapagos made, in her words “ridiculous
claims” to being eco-friendly. This happened over
dessert when we had agreed to talk about our
upcoming adventure. “How can a cruise ship operating
in the Galapagos using fossil fuel that has to be
imported to those islands, cruise ships that free
anchor (apparently tearing up reefs) at least two
times a day and pump the peoples pooh directly into
the ocean, possibly be eco-friendly?” There was a
moment of silence, neither my wife nor I had thought
at all in terms of an “eco-friendly” component in
our choice of how or with whom to travel. I finally
answered, “Well, I don’t know, honey, but really
thank you for your diligence.” I’ve learned the hard
way that sometimes it is just best to humor her.
Shea proceeded to show us a number of web sites
selling the same tours on the same boats, the odd
thing being that some of these web sites were only
web sites/dot coms, others were companies actually
involved in tourism in the Galapagos, but they were
based in Canada, Australia, England and the US,
almost everywhere it seemed except the Galapagos.
“What do you think of that?” I patiently tried to
explain to Shea that if it were not for these
companies and web sites no one would be going to the
Galapagos. Her response was “And that’s not such a
bad idea, except that I would like to get there
before it is exploited beyond recognition.” Teenage
kids… If you have one you understand. I am soon to
have two.
We had a wonderful time on our cruise tour. The only
negatives were that we spent far more time with our
fellow travelers than we did with nature or our
guides. It was like being trapped on a very tiny
floating island with a bunch of people you couldn’t
get away from and for my tastes we were spending (as
in paid for) too many hours with people I could have
done the same with in a bagel shop in the US for
free. Shea to my great consternation had time to
develop a small romance with the fifteen year old,
son of parents I didn’t really care for who besides
which seemed to encourage this romance. I certainly
wasn’t.
We were able to see some really incredible animals
and sites, albeit that we had to take turns, group
B, our group would be at a site for an hour, having
to leave when group A showed up and then we went off
to where group A had been. The guides were great,
attentive, knowledgeable, but you could really see
we weren’t any different to them as a group B than
hundreds of other group B’s that they manage year in
and year out, kind of a “canned” manner of talking
about the wildlife, etc. It also rankled me that we
were in group B rather than A or rather that our
group was called group B. I know that sounds silly,
but such is my mind sometimes when stressed. It was
as if we were somehow less important.
We eventually grew accustomed to the schedule, our
fellow travelers, our small births and bathrooms,
the rocking of the ship, the daily wonders being
delivered to us along with our meals on a schedule
so much so that I remember thinking toward the end
of the cruise perhaps we had made a mistake booking
a land based tour. Another week of what we were
doing wouldn’t be so bad as long as the kid and his
parents left as they were scheduled to do; on the
other hand I had only a vague idea of what was to
come next.
I had exchanged several e-mails with the owner of
Come to Galapagos. He had informed me that we were
rare, but not unique with our idea to sample both a
cruise and land based tour and that universally,
everyone who had been able to manage that
combination with them had come away with the same
reaction. “The people on the cruise tours don’t have
any idea what they missed or why.”
My family and I now do. It is one thing to
participate in a mass tourism experience that
actually lives up to its hype, as we did. It is
another to experience the same location with the
people that live there. There was no hype, their web
page was simple, straight forward and full of down
to earth information. There was more direct
information on that site than any other my daughter
had showed me and in her words, “No fluff, just the
real stuff.”
The “no fluff, just the real stuff” that we received
in the Galapagos with Come To Galapagos was far
beyond anything I might have imagined possible that
someone (in this case my daughter) could find on the
internet. It is one thing to hear a guide give his
canned speech; it is another to meet his wife and
family and to watch my family spend casual time with
him without sixteen other tourists/strangers around.
It is another to have our itinerary completely
thrown out the window for the opportunity to swim
with dolphins in the open ocean, as the opportunity
arouse, another to breakfast each morning with the
families that ran the hotel/B&B’s where we stayed,
to watch my kids playing with theirs. Our “schedule”
was organized around the tides, weather and our
energy level. We spent our time, on OUR schedule
with people who live there, our own customized
Galapagos private tour. We flew on small planes
between the islands (seeing the Galapagos from a
small plane was really a perspective giving treat),
had our own boats on day tours, fished with locals
and visited the farm where much of the food we ate
was grown. My daughter had with all of her internet
savvy chosen three places she wanted to see. We saw
them all, but only when the tide was right, when the
light was right for the photos she had envisioned
taking and when the animals would most likely be
willing to interact. We witnessed a giant tortoise
stampede, baby dolphins with their parents and had a
sea lion pup literally hug my daughter while
snorkeling. Nothing close to the above happened on
the “cruise tour” portion of our vacation.
Shea, in an exhausted, drowsy moment on the flight
back from the Galapagos, tucked her head into my
chest and said, “Dad, I had no idea where I was
pushing us to go, but thank you for listening.” Then
she slept and I said to no one who could hear, “I’m
proud of you.”
I needed to write a note, express my gratitude
publicly for the people that really, personally
showed us the Galapagos. The owner of Come To
Galapagos, Rick, met us at the airport, checked in
on us morning and night. We had the pleasure of
meeting his son, dinning with him one night and with
his wife, Bere another. She referred to us as she
does all their clients as “the hearts that come
here” and the people working with them as, “The
Family Come To Galapagos” (guides, restaurant
owners, hotel owners, chauffeurs, boat captains,
farmers and fishermen). These people really care for
the well being and education of their visitors and
the birth right of their children, the Galapagos
Islands.
Mike Stranton
Stanford, CA
July, 2011 |
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CST#2083876-40 |
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