We’re back from our 11 day trip to Ecuador (Quito, the capital city, and the Galapagos islands). The most difficult part of preparing for the trip was deciding what photographic equipment to take with me. The Girl insisted that we carry my 180mm macro lens, which I never ended up using.

What I did end up using was my brother’s Crumpler Whickey and Cox camera/laptop backpack, his 70-200mm f/4, my 17-40mm f/4 and 24-105mm f/4, 1 light stand, 1 shoot through umbrella, 1 580EX II flash, my SD500 compact with underwater case, and of course the 5D II. Add in assorted gels, filters, blower brush, lens pen, and wireless triggers, and there was barely enough room for clothes.

Luckily for us we didn’t need a lot of fancy clothes.

We toured the islands as part of a GAP Adventures group. There were 15 of us tourists in the group and GAP gave us duffel bags to repack our suitcase contents into. This made for much easier travel between islands.

The trip was an extremely active adventure full of hiking, biking, and snorkelling. The weather cooperated, the animals posed for photo ops, and our assorted bangs, bruises, and electrocutions were minor issues compared to our rewards for enduring them.

Not only did we luck out with all of that, but our group leaders were absolutely fantastic.

I’m slowly posting pictures of the trip to flickr. The lack of high-speed at home means that it’ll take at least a couple of weeks for all of them to get there, but as you’ll be able to understand once you see some of the shots, I’m glad that I carted all of that camera equipment around with me.

The islands truly do live up to their nickname, “The Enchanted Islands”. Their enchantments will remain with me for as long as I live and I’m pleased to see that the Ecuadorian government is taking extreme measures to preserve the biologic uniqueness of which the islands boast.

At some point in the near future, I’m sure we will all be able to look at the stewardship of these islands as an example of how we should all live and interact with the world about us.