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Galapagos with Amazon Jungle

17-day adventure

Detailed, day-by-day itinerary for this adventure!
Accommodations are noted, and meals are coded as B=breakfast, L=lunch, D=dinner

Top: Blue morpho butterfly, a regular sight along the Rio Napo. (Pat Huey) Below: Sacha Lodge cabana (Sacha)

Detailed Itinerary for Galápagos with Amazon Jungle

Day 1

Arrive in Quito, Ecuador

Fly from your home city to Quito, Ecuador. Upon arrival, you will be transferred to the Hilton Colón Quito hotel with check-in to your Club Floor accommodations.

Hilton Colón Quito

Day 2

To the Galapagos—Santa Cruz Island

Transfer to the airport for an early morning flight to Baltra, Galapagos. While our luggage is being collected, we enjoy refreshments in the air conditioned VIP airport lounge. We transfer to the Island of Santa Cruz where we travel with our naturalist in a spacious air conditioned vehicle up into the highland rainforest.

We'll have lunch then explore the Santa Cruz highlands to view endemic Galapagos plant species and visit lava tubes and sinkholes. We'll hike through tall grasses among the grazing tortoises.

Integrity groups will overnight at the Royal Palm Resort; Reina Silvia groups will overnight in Puerto Ayora.

Royal Palm Resort or Puerto Ayora hotel, BLD

Day 3

Puerto Ayora, Darwin Station, board our yacht

We stroll through the town of Puerto Ayora to the Charles Darwin Research Station, where we learn about conservation issues and the tortoise and iguana hatching and rearing programs. We'll even get to view some of the tiny hatchlings. We may catch a glimpse of Lonesome George—the sole survivor of the Pinta tortoise subspecies. Afterwards we lunch at a waterside restaurant overlooking Academy Bay. We board Integrity or Reina Silvia mid to late afternoon in Academy Bay.

Integrity or Reina Silvia, BLD

Day 4-9

On the Boat—Snoozin', Cruisin' and Snorkelin'

We live aboard our spacious yacht for a week, spending as much time ashore as the Park rules permit. With our licensed, INCA selected Class III naturalist, we learn about the birds and animals, geology, marine life and oceanic systems of the Galapagos Islands. We swim and snorkel with tropical fish, sea lions and sometimes with penguins!

The Integrity's 2011 itinerary (set by the Galápagos Park) includes visits to one or more sites on the islands of Española (Hood), Floreana, Fernandina, Isabela, Santiago, Bartolomé, Tower, North Seymour and South Plazas.

The islands visited will change in 2012 in accordance with new Galápagos National Park rules.

Integrity, BLD

Day 10

Galapagos, Quito

From our anchorage in the Baltra harbor, we say "adios" to our yacht and its dedicated crew, and adjourn to the Baltra airport to await our mid-morning flight to the Ecuador mainland and Quito. On arrival, we transfer to the Hilton Colón Quito hotel for an overnight. You will have time to shop before dinner.

Hilton Colón Quito, BD

Day 11

Quito

This is a day of leisure on your own. You may elect to explore the Old Town, walk in the park, visit the Botanical Gardens, work out in the hotel health club, have a massage, swim, do a bit of shopping and rest and relax. Lunch and dinner are on your own.

Hilton Colón Quito, B

Day 12-15

Sacha Lodge on the Rio Napo

We depart in the early morning from Quito on a 30-minute flight to Coca in the Upper Amazon Basin. Then it's down river by motorized canoe, heading ever deeper into the Ecuadorian jungle, where we spend five days experiencing firsthand this diverse and fragile wonder-of-the-world.

After check-in, we are ready to explore the jungle from many "points of view"-from the miles of hiking trails (some of the most pristine in the Amazon), from dugout canoe, or from a platform built 130 feet above the rain forest floor in a giant kapok tree.

We'll see butterflies and exotic flowers, including bromeliads and orchids, and will learn about medicinal plants. We can spot parrots, hundreds of which gather at a nearby natural salt deposit, toucans, the prehistoric hoatzin (a bird which has claws on its wings when young), anteaters and monkeys.

We can try to identify the makers of all the various weird and wonderful sounds we hear coming out of the forest canopy. As we canoe along the Amazon, we may see caimans dozing on shore as they have for thousands of years. Yet even in this lush and humid climate, there are hardly any biting insects!

At bedtime you drift off to sleep listening to the "night music" of the jungle. Throughout our jungle adventure, English-speaking naturalist guides share their knowledge and experience with us, helping to enrich our encounter with this immense tropical rain forest.

Sacha Lodge, BLD

Day 16

Rio Napo to Quito

When it's time to depart the jungle, we motor back upriver for a flight to Quito. We arrive in the late afternoon. Dinner is on your own tonight.

Hilton Colón Quito, BL

Day 17

Quito to home or other adventures

Transfer to the airport with check-in to your homeward bound flight unless you are remaining for more adventures.