Galapagos Luxury Cruises

Mainland Ecuador offers exciting opportunities to discover the Valley of the Volcanoes, the Amazon Jungle and the Ecuadorian cloud-forest as the premiere attractions. The volcano routes encompass such spectacles as Chimborazo, Riobamba, Alausi and colonial Cuenca on multi -day trips. These journeys escape to the wilds of a pristine land with glorious vistas at every turn. You will witness remote local cultures undertaking their daily lives much unchanged for centuries. The Amazon in Ecuador is another off the beaten track experience in lands of huge bio-diversity at Yasuni National Park. An alternative to the Amazon Jungle is a special visit to a hidden unique luxury lodge on a voyage of natural discovery in the secluded high cloud forests of Ecuador. Which one to choose!

The Galapagos Islands

These isles were found by fortune on March 10^th of 1535 by Fray Tomas de Berlanga, the fourth bishop of Panama. Sailing from Panama to Peru in a dispute between Francisco Pizarro (of Peru) and his lieutenants he was blown off course at a location he called The Enchanted Isles. It was an apt name for this archipelago is cast alone some 560 miles (900 km) miles west off the coast of Ecuador. The 13 tropical Galapagos Islands comprise officially what is known as the Archipelago of Columbus. A government wildlife site since 1935 and a UNESCO site since 1978 these islands are without compare on an evolutionary stage. The volcanically active isles here were formed between 700,000 and 5,000,000 years ago and they continue to evolve to this very day with active volcanoes still in evidence. Today only about 30,000 people live on the Galapagos Isles as 97% of the island chain are now a national park.

These remote lands were visited by Charles Darwin on his Voyage of the Beagle in 1835 to become the core of his theory of natural selection published in 1859 called “On the Origin of Species”. The island chain supports much variety of animal life. Its giant tortoises are thought to have some of the longest life spans of any creature on Earth with some reaching 150 years of age. Other noted species include the marine iguana (unique in the world), Darwin Finches, Galapagos Hawks, Blue and Red Footed Boobies, lava lizards and penguins. The marine iguana is also extremely unusual, since it is the only iguana adapted to life in the sea. The main attraction for the visitor today is how the animals have little fear of humans or other potentially predatory species due to their unique evolutionary heritage.