After spending a day in Quito, we arrived in the Galapagos and settled in to the Isabela II, our home for the next week.

The Isabela II is a 40-passenger yacht, smaller than any ship we have sailed on before.	The lounge served as the main public area for both relaxing and for lectures and the daily briefings.
The dining room is open-seating, so we were able to eat with just about everyone on board.	There was also a library with a nice selection of reference books on the Galapagos--Chuck was pleased to see that.
We also got an introduction to the "pangas" that would transport us from the ship to the islands each day.	We met our naturalists, Geoff, Mario, and Alex. All three are Galapagos natives and extremely knowledgeable about the islands.
In addition to providing information about the islands, the naturalists are responsible for protecting the fragile environment of the islands by ensuring that we stayed on the paths, didn't disturb the wildlife, etc.	We were also fortunate to have two additional naturalists with us: Craig MacFarland, the former director of the Darwin Research Station in the islands, and Joop Kuhn, from the Zoological  Society of San Diego, who was our escort throughout the trip.