Volcano Work - In The Galapagos

Me In The Middle - Servicing The Seismic Station

Our boat was called the Pirata (pirate). It had a huge skull and cross-bones flag and an amazing crew. It was a small sailing boat but easily housed us four scientists and three crew members. The crew included our captain, one handy-man and the most amazing chef. We had all our meals cooked for us throughout the four days and nights we spent on that boat and I can honestly say it was by far the best food I had eaten in a very long time. There was so much of it as well - we were certainly looked after.

On our first day, the boat departed Santa Cruz Island and headed for Island Isabela. This is the largest island in the Galapagos, yet it remains barely habitable. There is one town (Puerto Villamil) but thats about it. We would be spending some time in that town, but first we had some work to do. All the seismic stations we were servicing were located on Isabela, with most of them monitoring the activity of the Sierra Negra Volcano. The first seven stations were reachable only by boat, situated on the southern and south-western coastline. It took hours to reach Isabela and equally hours to travel from one station to another. This resulted in us all spending most of our time on the boat.............waiting.

The ocean around the Galapagos can become quite rough, and although it took me a day to get used to the constant swaying, I never really felt ill. Actually we were pretty lucky, as the waves were calm and the tide behaving!!! During the long hours we spent on the boat I lay in my bunk watching the ocean out of my port window and listening to my ipod or often I would head out on deck to chat with the guys and observe the scenery, and equally the wildlife. You would often see a seal pop its head out the water in a playful manner or a turtle come up for air. We saw albatrosses, blue-footed boobies (they are birds with bright blue feet if you were wondering) and flightless comorants. On our time skipping between seismic stations we were also lucky enough to see the Galapagos hawk, pelicans and penguins (the only penquin to be found in the northern hemisphere) and even bright pink flamingos. We even got the time to snorkel with a hatful of seals and sea lions, a few stingrays and a green turtle or two. Most would come right up to you just to say hello - particularly the seals. It was an amazing experience.

Our day usually involved getting up at very early hours. We had to time when to dock the boat on the island and do our volcano work, and equally when to be heading on to the next location. It was entirely tide and weather dependent so our hours of work were often random. We would usually only get one or two stations done each day. The work involved departing the boat and successfully docking where-ever we could on the island (close to the station of course). Then it would usually be a 10-20 minute walk over old pahoehoe and aa lava, to reach the station. All the stations were well hidden and only located by our very useful GPS. The stations need to be well hidden for a number of reasons but obviously number one - is security. Although not very useful to most people, the equipment at a station, in total, is quite a few thousand dollars. One station on the Galapagos had already been stolen.

A station basically consists of; a seismometer - the main piece of gear which monitors seismic activity from the volcano; a GPS; a number of boxes for connecting the devises together and keeping it all running; and a solar panel - for power. Our job was simple - to take the data that had been recorded and put in a new "memory card" as it were, so monitoring could continue. In reality, we had to check that everything was working, clean the solar panel, download the data and go through numerous checks on different aspects of the station. It would usually take about forty minutes to an hour to complete each one. Cynthia always took the data box with her at the end so she could later upload the information to her computer. Conditions were usually pretty good - although it was always baking hot. Still, for those first few days we only ended up doing an hour or two hours work per 24 hours. Life was pretty easy.

I have mixed feelings about being on that boat. In general im not really a sea person. I prefer to travel on land or by air. Its not that I hate being on the ocean, its just that swaying around for four days straight really gets to me after a while. Most of the time I really enjoyed being on the boat though. Sailing around the Galapagos is something which many thousands of tourists each year pay many thousands of dollars to do. I was doing it for free. Because we were working on a scientific project we also had permission (by the Charles Darwin Foundation and the Galapagos National Park) to sail to parts of the island that tourists are not allowed to go. It was like our own personal private tour. During the day, the crew would throw out a line and wait for a fish. One one occasion, I watched as they struggled to bring in a giant Tuna. They landed it in the end and it ended up on our dinner plate a few hours later. Although I am not partial to eating anything from the sea - I quite enjoyed that Tuna - it was certainly fresh. Most boats do not have permission to fish in the waters around the Galapagos either. The best part about being on the boat though, was sailing during sunset. I can't tell you how amazing those sunsets were, photos do not do it justice. Each night, I always went up on deck, ipod in hand and watched the sun set for a good hour.

We completed our 7 boat-reachable stations on the forth day. The station locations were always different and that made things interesting. One was on a small island off Isabela. Another, you had to trek through bushes and shrubs to reach. Next to one of the stations (well a 10 minute walk away) was a small set of lakes within a sea of black lava. There was nothing for miles around and yet within these lakes, swam five or six pink flamingos - it was pretty amazing. The stations were all serviced correctly and generally there were no real problems. We had to look out for the odd insect (mainly spider) hiding in our equipment boxes, and the flys out there on Isabela are a real pain, but generally it all went pretty smoothly. One station was poorly placed and not collecting data properly so we pulled it out completely - the rest were working to perfection.

The four of us also got on pretty well. I had met Cynthia briefely at the IG some time ago but in reality - I didn't really know any of these guys before this trip. It didn't take long for everyone to bond and with all the boat stations complete and everything going well so far - everyone was enjoying the trip and having fun. It wouldn't take long though, before all that changed......................