Food

Feb 13, 2012

As part of my Budget Galapagos tour with Bamba Experience, they have included all of my meals on the islands for me. It has been a bit confusing to figure out how this works because I don’t speak Spanish, but I think we have it all sorted out now.

This morning a lady came for me at 8am to tell me that breakfast would be downstairs and someone was picking me up at 9am for my tour. At 8:30am, I strolled downstairs to get breakfast. They cooked me scrambled eggs (quite yummy), a roll with jam, some kind of fresh fruit juice, tea, a small slice of processed meat and cheese. The processed meat tasted like salami to me, but it looked like ham. Not sure what it was. I tried the cheese and it was delicious, but I have issues with dairy, and they recommend not eating a lot of dairy because the milk isn’t processed the same as it is back home. So, I tasted it, enjoyed it and then decided not to each the whole chunk of cheese.

For lunch, my driver of the afternoon (Darwin) and my own personal tour guide (Mariana) ate with me. All of my included meals are taken care of at a little place called Le Chocolate Restaurante. All of the meals there have been lovely so far. At lunch, it was nice to have Mariana as she told me what I was eating! I had tamarindo juice (sweet, but a little bit gritty from seeds I think … I hope!), lentil and beef soup (very yummy) and the main dish was tuna and rice. I’m not a big fan of fish, but decided I would try it. It was good and didn’t taste like fish at all. There was so much there that I couldn’t eat it though!

Tonight, for supper, the ladies from the hotel came up to my room and told me I could go for supper at the Chocolate Restaurant. I didn’t realize that they meant I needed to go right then. A few minutes later another staff member came up and in broken English said ‘Let’s go.’ … she was taking me to the restaurant. I thought she was going anyway and was just going to take me with her, but no, she stopped a truck, we got in and he drove us to the restaurant. I got out and expected her to come with me, although I was fine to go alone. She didn’t get out. I guess she was just getting me a drive there so I wouldn’t get lost.

I had a choice for supper between battered shrimp, spaghetti and fish. I decided to try the shrimp and it was super tasty. The batter was light and flaky, the shrimp fresh and plump. On the side there was a mixture of potatoes, carrots and broccoli. Here in the Galapagos, the potatoes they serve are slightly yellow. They are dry, but very tasty. I didn’t add anything to the meal … no salt, no pepper, no butter. It was good just the way it was.

So, now I know that breakfast is from 7am-8:15am, lunch is from 1 – 2:15pm and supper is from 7pm-8pm. Now that I have that all figured out, I can go to The Chocolate Restaurant on my own anytime during those hours. This makes life much easier over the next couple of days. Oooops! Guess I was late for breakfast, lunch and supper today. I’ll try to do better tomorrow. No wonder they were knocking on my door telling me to go have supper! I just didn’t know they meant immediately.

I look forward to sharing my next meals with you from afar!