sea level: the hemispheric limbo world record

"Hey Brad," Paul shouts over the waves buffeting the hull of our little boat, "what altitude do you think we're at right now?"

I look around at the unbroken ocean and grin over my shoulder at him, "Probably sea level." A few minutes later I am deathly ill over the side of the boat, and he and Brad both grab my waist to keep me from plunging overboard into the spray. The tiny boat has been riding ocean swells like a rollercoaster for almost two hours, and I've had enough. For me, who has hardly survived any boat ride without getting sick, two and a half hours across the open ocean in a pinprick launch is hell.

But a gorgeous one at that. The water glitters clear cerulean, a color I have not seen in probably at least five years and a color that I love. I survive the trip to our glass-front hotel, separated from the beach by a narrow dirt road, and spend the afternoon bodysurfing, watching for sharks in the crests of waves. No sharks, but the silhouette of a sea lion darts through the thin green wall of water fifteen feet away from us.

I am surely more mermaid than sailor.

***

We take rolls of film full of iguanas, splayed out on the rocks to absorb heat or swimming across an island lagoon, a dragon-like head barely visible above the surface of the water. Watch flamingos and herons and fragates and boobies of all colors and sizes, lean precariously over the shark resting area, where at least four white-tipped tiburones hide from the midday sun, over the side of the boat to catch a glimpse of a sea turtle soaring alongside. Three times we snorkel with sea turtles and twice with a baby sea lion, darting around our group and even accompanying us to the shore when we head in to take off our mask and flippers.

Dana and I, sunning ourselves on the front of the boat, ask the boatdrivers if there are pirates in these islands. No? Mermaids? (The Spanish word is sirena, which makes me smile asking, thinking of Odysseus.) "Yes -- two," he replies, grinning at us. They invite us and our ten friends out dancing to Bar de Beto that night. A son of theirs, who bears the magnificent name "El Capitan Junior," becomes a great friend and important landmark on helado-hunting excursions into the tiny town for snacks and ice cream.

The afternoons pass us on the beach, reading, napping, chatting, or bodysurfing. After a shouted exchange with some guys with a soccer ball, they invite us to play and we gather a team. While we duck waves to cool off, my teammate Gabriel and his compañero Luis introduce themselves and invite us to a discotek for islanders. "Bar de Beto is full of Americans," they say, scoffing -- tourists themselves, from Quito and Guayaquil respectively. In these islands, people actually believe that I am ecuatoriana.

We try to do both. The girls all put on dresses and makeup and nurse expensive drinks while the guys hit on the bartender, a gorgeous 18-year-old from Texas. I still don't know how she got there... We girls leave early and leave them to their flirting, and on the way home decide to take a naked dip in the dark ocean.

On our last day on Isabela we hike up a volcano. We start at the bottom in needlepoint drizzle, at first tiptoeing around the mud on the path until we realize it is probably safer to run, and by the time we reach the top our legs are covered in splattered volcanic soil. The sun gradually burns off the mist so we can see into the crater. The clouds moving through it create the odd impression that we are being sucked into the crater, full of four-year-old volcanic rock, and a rainbow crowning the great canyon gives us the impression that unicorns and leprechauns could emerge at any moment.

The next day we have to madrugar to catch the Launch from Hell at 5:30am. I survive this trip by holding a high stakes conversation with Brad and Dana, covering nearly every possible topic and every possible side of the issue. This time, the rolling waves feel more like a thrill ride and we make it to harbour without incident.

...And promptly onto another boat, a yacht cruise called Poseidon, for the day. We are all so sunburnt from Volcán Chico and so tired from waking up so early that we pass out on the upper deck. At one point I awake under the table surrounded by Brad, Jason, and Paul, all of us sprawled on the floor wherever we could find space. Today we take a few hour-long jaunts around tiny unnamed islands, where I see more carcasses than I ever have before -- of sea lions, iguanas, birds, crabs, and anything else you might imagine. We are also privileged enough to witness the mating dance of the endemic blue-footed booby, whose mating call sounds like the whistle that comes out when you blow on those serrated plastic straws from sippy cups. The boys all vow to try that tactic when they get back to campus in the fall, and I wish them luck. Sort of.

On Santa Cruz we visit a ranch for breeding Galápagos land tortoises. The path is full of guavas and the guide explains to us that someone brought them here and they now threaten the delicate balance of the ecosystem, because their seeds spread and their trees grow faster than they can be eradicated. Between guava trees a few Galápagos coffee trees show clusters of red and green berries, the seeds of which become the coffee beans sold at Starbucks worldwide. The next ranch is more of a country club, where we dance and play cards and sports until lunch. In the afternoon we pull a fast one at the Charles Darwin Research Station, breaking up into groups of three to avoid paying a guide for the afternoon. The Estación basically consists of a cluster of buildings used for researching conservation efforts, and is also the home of Lonesome George, the last tortoise of his species. He is pushing 150 years and refused to use his mating years, so he remains the lone member of his type, and holds the burden of extinction on his rapidly weakening shell.

That night we dressed up and went out for sushi, at an expensive beachfront hotel restaurant where I blew $30 on sushi and the best, creamiest piña colada of my life. A middle-aged American tourist approaches us with the typical traveling-students small talk, and explains that he made a "huge mistake" on his order and accidentally got 64 rolls of sushi, and did we want to help him eat some of it. He didn't even have to ask. We went home full and happy and in awe of the world's little miracles.

***

On one of our excursions we encountered the tree of the poison apple, which burns your skin at a mere touch. The squashed and fallen apples and their pits scatter the path and I can't help thinking as we walk along, "Is this Paradise? Is this the legendary Garden of Eden, the back of the Great Turtle?" The basis of fairy tales and the beginnings of religions, of species, of Evolution. All here in one place, the famed archipelago full of animals found nowhere else on earth, formed from the aftermath of volcanic eruptions, found on the latitudinal Center of the Earth, the impossible made visible and the world's miracles at our outstretched fingertips. It is, and is not, unbelievable.