anyone been to galapagos?

[ricardo_carvajal1]

If so, I would appreciate recommendations on travel arrangements, guides, tours, etc. Thanks.

[bob_atkins]

Sorry, I have not been there myself, but I have friends who have.

One piece of advice is to make sure the tour you are on is

specifically designed for photographers. That way you will get

on land early (to catch the best light) and leave late (again to

catch the best light). If you get on a "tourist" tour you may

be frustrated by the schedule which may have a leisurely breakfast

and get you on land when the sun is overhead and the lighting

for photography is at its worst, then get you back on the boat

for an early dinner, missing the best light of the day again!

If you have any doubts about the tour schedule, ask.

 

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I think my freinds went on a tour run by the Gerlachs (pretty

well known nature photographers), but I could be wrong.

[don_baccus4]

I've been there, many years ago when my camera system was an Argus C3, unfortunately (it almost hurts to admit this in public). I'd like to go back!

 

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Going on a photo-oriented tour, as Bob suggests, is a good idea. Since you have to go on a guided boat anyway, might as well go on one which caters to photographers. It is also possible for a group of people to rent a smaller boat and guide, but then you need to find a boatload of friends to go with you. At least go on a smaller boat, they're allowed to go to some spots which are closed to the larger boats and tend to be more flexible. The Lonely Planet guide gives some specific recommendations for boat owners that are reasonable and somewhat flexible. You must understand and respect the fact that the place is heavily managed, to conserve the wildlife in the face of heavy visitation. Because of this, from the photographer's point of view, all visitation options are a compromise because you won't be free to roam at will at times of your choice. Despite this, you'll have a great time.

 

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Regarding gear, this is a spot I'd love to go back to now that I'm seriously into bird photography. Though you're restricted in many places to trails and must be with a guided group, many birds such as boobies and albatrosses nest right on or next to a trail. This is a great place to indulge oneself in what I consider to be a rare and unusual treat: intimate photographs of wild birds eye-to-eye on the ground with short lenses.

 

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Since you typically get your feet wet when going from boat to island, you want to be able to carry all of your gear. This is a place where a 300/4 + 1.4x, and 80-200 zoom, and 17-35 zoom would make a great kit. The 300 + 1.4x would give you a very adequate 420/5.6 for shooting some of the birds which are at a distance. They're all very acclimatized to people, but not all are on the trail, of course. As I recall, for instance, we were about fifty feet away from displaying

frigate birds.

 

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Though Bob mentioned the perils of noon-day sun, it is also frequently cloudy. We had sun fierce enough to give me one of the three or four episodes of sunburn I've had in my life (I'm somewhat olive-skinned), but also overcast weather.

 

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Oh, you also want some sort of close-focusing lens - I'd bring my 100/2.8 macro on a return trip. There are interesting crabs and the like along the shore.

 

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Of course, once you've bought a ticket to Ecuador, you might as well explore the Andes villages for a few days or weeks. I suggest spending as little time in Guayaquil as possible, like zero outside of switching planes at the airport if you choose to take Tame' airlines to the islands. If you're into exploring more of Ecuador, as I suggest, Quito is much nicer. I flew down on Ecuador's airline, on an old 707. I was fascinated the entire flight down, watching a rivet in the wing which was wiggling crazily the entire time. It disappeared upon landing, leaving a little hole in the wing. The

approach involved complicated twists and turns around the peaks surrounding the plateau that Quito's built on (at about 8,500 feet). The mostly-Ecuadorian planeload of passengers literally gave the pilot a standing ovation when we landed, which made me wonder.

 

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Some of our checked bags disappeared. After returning, I went after the airline for money, and they stonewalled. Came home from work one day six months later and my bag was sitting on the porch as though some magician had been in the neighborhood.

 

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Flying to the islands, on Tame' airlines, I was humored to find I was flying on a Lockheed Electra, a turboprop that became famous in the 50s for a couple of accidents in the US where the wings fell off mid-flight...

 

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I found Ecuadorians, especially the rural people in the Andes, to be amazingly friendly and outgoing. In one grill (kind of a national fetish) the head of a family insisted on buying my ex-wife and I all sorts of food treats to be grilled at our table. Had all sorts of interesting experiences like eating at a Korean restuarant in the middle of nowhere in the Andes.

[bob_atkins]

One other comment. I believe there is still a total ban on the use

of any kind of flash on the Galapagos islands. Runmor is that

it was originally a ban to stop the littering of the place by flashbulbs!

Whether or not this is true, there is still a ban, and it's

enforced, so fill-flash is not an option (making working in harsh

sunlight even more of a problem).

[glen_johnson]

At Sam Abell's workshop in Dayton, Sam talked about his assignment in the Galapagos for National Geographic. He said that there had been two basic problems. First of all, it was easy to get caught up in the excitement of the great subjects, and to forget about the rules of good composition. Second, some of the subjects presented real exposure challenges - like very light colored birds against very dark rocks. Of the 500 +/- rolls shot by the team working on the project, he speculated that maybe as many as 200 rolls had been totally wasted.

 

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I guess the punchline is that this is a great place for wildlife photography, but you do have to think about what you're doing to get good results. :-)

[ShunCheung]

Exposure at the Galapagos can be a bit tricky because of the dark

lava rocks in the background. Fortunately, a few weeks before my trip

in November 1995, I watched the photo safari program on ESPN with

Davis Muench to the Galapagos. Muench mentioned that one should

under-exposre by about 0.5 stop to darken those rocks when they are

in the background. I found that rule works very well. Still, when in

doubt, I bracked my exposure for potentially good shots.

 

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For more details about the Galapagos, please read my article at:

http://www.photo.net/photo/nature/galapagos.html

[cagan_sekercioglu]

While backpacking in Ecuador, I got a ride on a French yacht going to Galapagos from Guayaquil. It took three days. When I got there, I got on a tour for $50/day and spent 4 days on the tour, 1 day on a diving trip and 2 days on my own at Santa Cruz. Decent and basic hotels cost about $10. I got some good shots. You can see some at thtp://jasper1.stanford.edu/~cagan/southamerica.htm

The whole trip there cost me $500. Add $150 if you fly round trip. Good luck