Galapagos Land Adventure in Puerto Ayora | ECUADOR 2022
My Galapagos adventure is not over yet. So I left everyone on the cruise and I headed over to Finch Bay, which is a luxury hotel in Puerto Ayora. Let me tell you, I am so looking forward to relaxing, eating and exploring the island. One of the things I wanted to mention about this landscape is that they really put an emphasis on native trees. And that makes a huge difference because water is an issue here and native trees to Ecuador use less water. And so the landscaping here is very purposeful and it's beautiful.
You don't have landscapes like this anywhere else. The other thing is they do have other own water treatment system. One of …I think they may be the only ones. Or at least one of the few that have invested in this, Galapagos has always had issues with access to fresh water. Finch Bay has so many gorgeous photos on its website but I'm going to share with you what it looks like with video.
Oh, it is poolside at Finch Bay and it is gorgeous here. I've got the pool in front of me and right behind it is the ocean and you have this breeze. It is so beautiful. The hardest part of lunch today was choosing one to eat.
Now of course, you know, I'm looking for traditional Ecuadorian food. But in the Galapagos they don't really have a traditional Galapagueña food. And that is because a lot of people came here in the last 200 years, and they brought their traditions from the mainland. However, we're in the middle of the ocean. Some of the best seafood in the world. So I'm starting with an octopus salad with red pepper, and then I'm moving on to pescado encocado.
And that is a very traditional Ecuadorian seafood dish, where fish is cooked in a coconut sauce. Fish today is mero, which is grouper. I had pescado encocado a few weeks ago in Salango, and it was amazing.
I still remember it was like, light and bright and silky and coconutty. It's like all of the things you want in a seafood dish when it is hot outside, they also gave me… there’s pan de yuca, pan de…I don’t know… it’s just like a wheat. And then this, it looks like it's a croissant. But actually in Ecuador they call it enrolla…enrollado you gotta pronounce those Rs correctly. Starting off with octopus salad. Normally when you order salad in Ecuador, it tends to be a handful of cabbage, maybe a slice of tomato and cucumber, but this is actually a really big salad.
So we have some… it looks like iceberg lettuce…maybe some romaine lettuce. I've got some slices of cucumber, tomato, carrots, a lot of octopus. Oh god this is really good. Very tender, almost has like a charred flavor. Oh, I made the right decision. A lot of people overcook octopus, and because it's a weird chewy thing.
But really you just need a great marinade or dressing, charring it brings out fantastic flavor. And if you're wondering what octopus really tastes like. It actually doesn’t really taste like a lot. It has a very, very mild flavor. That's why it's really great, charred, grilled. Like if you had that char flavor it’s fantastic or lime.
Even spice works really well. It goes well with a lot of things. But it has to be cooked properly, and not everyone knows how to do it. This is cooked very well.
When Christian brought out this pescado encocado, I knew it was going to taste good. I haven't tried it yet but let me tell you it is so bright and colorful the sauce looks so smooth. Oh my god, I'm so excited. Okay, so we've got mero, which is grouper in encocado, which is a coconut sauce. There's some tomatoes on top. Oh there's a bird here that is trying to eat my bowl of rice.
Now I'm not going to eat this rice, but you are not supposed to feed the animals. So just going to put it off to the side. However, I am going to eat this patacone. So when you get encocado on the coast, of course, there are patacones, rice because you have to have two starches. I eat the patacones.
Alright, let's try this fish. It looks cooked perfectly. It just falls apart, I'm going to get some sauce on this.
Look at that fish. It is cooked perfectly. It smells good. Oh my god, smells like there’s bacon in here. There's something smoky.
Oh wow. I think that smokiness is actually a char from how they cooked the fish. The fish…yeah… was cooked. The fish was grilled.
It has this like smokey char flavor to it. Oh my god it’s so good. This is by far the best cooked fish I've had in Ecuador. The encocado sauce itself is very thin, not too thick. It's not like a thick creamy sauce. Other stuff in it I don't know? It's very rich but light so there's definitely lime balancing it.
The food here is really really good. People here know how to cook seafood. It's fantastic. So one of the things that I like about Finch Bay is that it's actually not in town. It's a little farther away. So you feel very secluded but also at the same time it takes literally 60 to 120 seconds to get into town.
They have a water taxi that is free and then Danny when I got it in, the driver, he actually went out a little bit so I could see a blue-footed booby and a seal. And then, of course, when we landed, he's like, oh, there's another seal. Even if you don't know, Spanish, you do need to know the words of the most important animals, like lobo or lobito. That's a sea lion. Okay, so just found out six or seven blocks straight up the hill to the market.
They told me to get a taxi, but honestly, I can do six or seven blocks. Lots of restaurants down this way. I think this might be the one that turns into tables out on the street later in the day. I think this is the bus station right here, which means there's always food around that. This is the municipal market. Oh my god.
I used to come here. I think on the other side, this is where... Okay, so at first, I had some problems finding the Municipal Market.
And I thought everything would be there, even though I knew there was a separate fish market. Anyway, talked to some guys, everyone's quite nice. They told me I was in the wrong place and so now I'm heading down to the muelle…muelle? Of the fisherman. Okay. Muelle de los pescadores esta aqui? Muelle de los pescadores… See, this is why you ask every so often because those kids were right. I did mean to turn down but I also needed to take a bit of a detour too.
Disciple, el muelle de los pescadores esta alla? Si. Okay. Gracias. These actually look really nice. Gala Hotel. I think when you first visit a place, you want to stay really central and then you realize you could go out two or three blocks save a lot of money.
If you thought when you get off your cruise it would be the last time you saw sea lions…no! Come down to the fishermen’s wharf and you’ll still see lots of them. However, they tell you really good advice. Let me get closer so you can see.
Don’t get closer than 2 meters. Social distancing. And never take a photo of an animal with flash.
If you wanted to, one of the most traditional dishes is brujo frito. Brujo is scorpion fish, lobster’s. $25.
As a Nova Scotian I can’t do that. Galapagos’ first craft beer. I think a lot of people are surprised when they come to Puerto Ayora. It is the largest town in the Galapagos. And really is a town, a large town.
There are seven high schools here, there are tons of amenities: grocery stores, cafes, breweries, hotels, lots of things for tourists, but also, this is where a lot of locals live. And so, it's really a place where, well, the last time I stayed here, five weeks. I don't know what I did. I didn't even go on any other tours. I just hung around town.
It was fantastic. Freshwater is a huge issue here. I don't actually have enough fresh water on the island so the best way to get it is actually to keep a container and you can get it here. Not actually a bad price. One liter is 25 cents.
And that's brujo, that's scorpion fish. They've got that here too. First impressions coming back to Puerto Ayora is that it's gotten kind of fancy. They're some really nice places here. Of course, it’s been eight years. So I didn't expect it to look exactly the same but it's actually looking pretty good.
It's not looking overdeveloped. I was actually worried about one point, that there was going to be too much development when I was here. There was so much building going on and it's an island.
It's so hard to get things out here. I didn't know if they were building too quickly and they wouldn't be able to sustain it. But..oh wow, there's a Golden Prague pub here too, which you can go to in Cuenca. It’s a good reason to stay here for a couple days for sure. There's lots to do if you stay in town, or you can also do day trips onto other islands.
Oh sancocho blanco! Actually looks…fish…salad…yeah, this is where I'm going. All right so I already knew this but tough lesson to learn. If you want to go see the fishermen you need to go early in the day.
They open at 7 o’clock. So I will remember that and I’m going to try to come tomorrow. Around here there are a number of places to eat.
I think $20 for seafood is reasonable here. Although it’s reasonable here if you’re from away. The $20 lunch will probably be 35-40 where you’re from. Not where I’m from and also not what I’m used to in Ecuador. So instead I came looking for an almuerzo.
And I found it. I’m at Mi Tierra and they have almuerzo here for $5, which I think is very reasonable. Generally on the mainland you’ll have one for $3 or in a really touristy area $4. So we’re starting off with sancocho blanco.
Sancocho is a soup you’ll find in a lot of Latin American countries. You’ll find it in Colombia, in Cuba, pretty much everywhere. Even if they don’t call it sancocho. It is basically a broth based soup that is simmered, usually with some meat or chicken bone.
Sometimes you’ll get a whole piece of chicken in it. This is just chicken bone for flavoring. And I believe that this is green plantain. One of the keys to knowing you’re going to get sancocho is this, there’s always a piece of corn in it. I love corn.
I love corn in Ecuador. However, I don’t know how to eat this. I guess you have to take it out. Anyway, I usually don't get to it. So that’s the starter and then for the mains, you could either get a lasagna with meat or you could get a fried fish. And I asked what kind it was and it was albacore tuna.
Albacore tuna lunch for $5 is a bargain. And I don’t necessarily think paying more gets you a better meal. So yes if you want to have ceviche down there you can do ceviche for $20. But this is going to be a great meal. And also I just had such fantastic food at Finch Bay that if I’m going to spend $20-25 I’m going to go back there.
Let’s try the sancocho. I want to try this first. It feels like it’s like a plantain dumpling. Yeah I would call it like a mashed plantain dumpling. It’s kind of gooey like a dumpling. Ooh this broth.
This broth is so good. I love starting a meal with soup. In fact I could just have soup as a meal. This is really good. And of course it’s got yuca, which is like, I don’t know if you’ve watched my videos before you know I love yuca. I love pan de yuca, fried yuca, like steamed yuca.
I like every kind of yuca. This is good. Main dish is here, so fried albacore tuna filet. We’ve got a bit of salad.
This is actually one of the better salads I’ve seen. I’ve mentioned it many times but salad is usually just a handful of cabbage, one slice of tomato, one slice of cucumber. Very similar here, anyway that’s how you eat it and you have a lot of rice.
That’s because an almuerzo is supposed to be something that is really filling. And all of these things together for $5 is still a bargain. This fish is really good. I’ve had so much tuna since I’ve been in Ecuador and I have to say they have fantastic tuna.
Normally I would not want to eat it all the time. But whenever I hear there’s albacore I know it’s going to be good. Even the canned tuna here that costs $1 tastes like what we would pay $5 for in Canada. It’s just better quality. This is really good too.
Mi Tierra, highly recommended. So pretty at night. Oh, you can't quite see me. However, you can have dinner inside or outside.
I'm having dinner inside because although this candlelight looks gorgeous, you won't be able to see my food. And this food is good and so I'm going to show you what it looks like. I have been looking forward to dinner all day. And that’s because lunch and breakfast here were so good. But I also wanted to just let you in behind the scenes here because this is a really beautiful dining room.
Just so light and they bring out the candles. If you want, you can eat outside, but I am eating by myself and I have unique camera needs. So they were so nice. They put me at a table for two, that was long in the back, so I wouldn't annoy anyone. But then also, I was like, so dark.
How am I going to show these people food? And if I just have one candle? So let me show you this, but they gave me two. So perfect lighting for me because I know how important it is for everyone that you see the food. Now, we're starting off with bread. We have a focaccia, we have some whole wheat bread, a whole wheat breadstick, and then we have some pesto. And this they say is a butter made with fresh herbs, which I'm guessing is from the garden.
And Sauvignon Blanc from Chile is one of my favorite wines. So I am very excited for dinner. And if you've ever wondered, do I feel awkward eating with a camera in front of me in places? And the answer is yeah, like sometimes yes. Because inevitably someone notices, well, I've got a camera on the table and that I'm talking to it.
However I find the more often I do it, the less awkward I feel. And then I just really love places like this, where they just get it. That I want to be hidden away from everybody else. I also don’t want to ruin people's romantic dinners here.
I'm going to try some of the focaccia with the basil. Oh god. You know basil is such a classic. Like basil pesto, I made so much of it over the summer.
I love it. I never get tired of it. So fresh. The bread here is amazing.
I watched a YouTube video today where someone said bread in Ecuador was terrible. They are eating bread in the wrong places. So good. It was really hard to choose a starter. There was so many great things. I really wanted the tuna tartare, but I had tuna for lunch.
So instead I decided I needed some vegetables, I got the chakrita salad. Now, this actually…most of it comes from their garden. We've got cucumber and carrot and tomato and radish and lots of good vegetables. It's in a… I think a mustard citrus sauce.
Oh it’s really good. It's like up very light. But yes, like a bit mustardy but not too much and just like a really nice salad to start the meal. It's hard to get a good salad in Ecuador. If you only have a one fish dish in the Galapagos, it should be brujo. That translates to wizard.
But in English, we actually call it scorpion fish. We sometimes call it stonefish or rockfish. And that's because the fish is actually found as a bottom feeder. You'll find it in the rocks, stones in the coral.
Anyway, let's get to the fish. This isn't a sauce that is like tomato and…. It's a tomato, fresh tomato sauce. It's really good.
The sauce…and then the fish cooked perfectly, I knew it would be. So brujo has a thicker texture which is great. It's almost like a hearty white fish. Some people say it's like if you combined a white fresh fish with a lobster, it has that kind of like hearty texture, which is filling. They cook fish perfectly here.
I'm going to use my hands. On the outside look how well that is cooked. It almost it has like a crust, but here is just like, so tender. It’s so good.
They do a really great job. I will catch you tomorrow for breakfast. And I can’t wait to see what we’re going to eat.
Tigrillo. This is really different. Bacon in it. And I think mani. Guys, I did not shoot coming to the airport because I didn't think it was going to be very interesting. However, I've got to say service at Finch Bay from start to finish has been amazing.
There are a lot of times you go to a hotel and when you arrive it's like oh it's like the welcome wagon, but getting home, it's like you're a schlub that people have forgotten. Not true here. So this morning, they told me to leave my bag outside my room.
They would take care of it because I need to walk to the water taxi. Walked to the water taxi. My bag was on the boat. Took two minutes to get to Puerto Ayora. In Puerto Ayora someone was there.
They took my bag, they put it in a taxi. Then I had a 40 minute taxi drive with Juan Luis, who was amazing. Had a great time talking about food, and the pandemic in the Galapagos. And then I thought, oh, we're here at the ferry part of this ride and he would leave me there.
That's not true. He got on the boat with me. So we got on the boat and then there was a bus ride 10 minutes.
He got on with me. In fact, Juan Luis came with me all the way to the airport. Took my bag the whole time, didn't carry a thing. Then when we got here, he handed off my bag to someone from the VIP lounge.
That's right. I have access to the VIP lounge where there's coffee and juice and there's a charger and there are snacks. And I'm just going to wait here.
It's actually really really nice. However, I'm not going back to Canada. So, I'll see you on the mainland.
2022-03-26 08:31
