Oli awoke in great pain and had to lie with an ice pack on his back for ½ hour. We had scrambled egg, lousy coffee and juice, and toast and guava jam for breakfast. There were four marine iguanas, three pelicans and a giant blue heron keeping us company on the patio. The heron really hates the pelicans, and chases them off whenever they come too near. One of the iguanas walked right between Oli and me and then underneath Oli’s legs. What is fantastic to us is just commonplace to the locals.

A little later on we went for a walk up to the Tortoise Sanctuary and took a lot of photographs of tortoises lizards and birds. The souvenir shop closed at 11.30 until 2.30, so I said I’d come back at three. We met the head of the Darwin Centre, and asked her advice on which islands to visit on one day tours. Her reply was that all of the Galápagos Islands were beautiful. We walked down town and stopped at Jaquelina’s shop to get a book for Kim. We had to go back at three for it when Jaquelina’s sister, Alexandra would be there. Jaquelina tried to set up a tour for us, but all she could get was one to a bay on the same island.

We went to a restaurant, which Oli had identified as being very popular, for lunch. We had arroz marinero and jugo de papaya - not very good. We eventually found an agent, by the west end restaurant, who could book us a tour departing our hotel at 5am the next morning for Isla Bartolomé ($50 each). In a shop I bought two books, on Oli’s recommendation, for S/-5000. Later Oli remembered that he hadn’t really liked them after all! They are the Mordant series by Stephen R Donaldson, and Oli wanted to read the second one because he couldn’t remember the conclusion.

At three I went to the bookshop again. Alexandra was there and she told me to come back at five. I went up to the Tortoise Sanctuary shop and bought Kim some books, and Joy and I a 1995 Galápagos calendar. Back to the room to read a little, then back to the bookshop. This time Alexandra told me that the boss had the keys to the store; could I come back tomorrow? I said I’d be back on Wednesday.

We went to the 4 Lantinas for supper. Oli and I had pepper steaks. Dad had a herb steak which was really tough and had to be sent back. After a wait, we had the same cut as us and it was wonderful.