I'm considering a trip to Galapagos next year, but apparently all liveaboards have been barred by the authorities.
Does anyone know what the land-based diving is like? Is it significantly inferior to Darwin & Wolf, the two remote islands that are supposed to be the most spectacular?
What are the chances of seeing humpbacks and whale sharks on a land-based trip?
I am one of the people that bang the drum for land based Galapagos. Few divers from the US or Canada can be bothered, they have been so intensely marketed by the Liveaboards- they can see it no other way. In fact,
more people dive the Galapagos land based than by liveaboard. Most of them were not raised speaking English, many Europeans, and it is a younger crowd, but I have always enjoyed their company!
I have done it both ways. Sure- if it's available and
if you can afford it, I think everyone ought to dive it from a liveaboard, at least once. Darwin and Wolf can be spectacular, but remember it eats up 1.5 days of your trip, at sea in travel.
I have seen all the same critters, not in the same quantity diving land based, but
the same from either option. I have not seen a Whale in the Galapogos. Unfortunately, once people have a good experience on a liveaboard, they are unlikely to be swayed from it to land based. Too bad.
Land based has a lot of positives for it, but it is seemingly contrary to my standard droning mantra, "dive dive dive". It would be a shame to drag all the way to the Galloping Pogos and not spend
a lot of time exploring the islands in detail- on a liveaboard you really will not be able to do this, on a cruise ship your diving will be limited severely. Very few destinations do I recommend anything other than "maximum diving", but Galapagos is similar to the Red Sea- better see the Pyramids, right?
Look at our trip report and note many of the cool things that were available. Every night, a different inexpensive restaurant, two very cool lava tunnel tours, the highlands where the turtles
really live, the lava domes, the Darwin Research Station, the interesting town and all of the very legitimate art salons. Very few places that have great diving also offer these diversions.
It would be like going to New Zealand for snow skiing and not getting out of the mountains to see some of the island. Another, closer analogy: Most people only see and understand the wonderful diving of Tobago from the liveaboard. Boy- are they missing this natural haven's land based wonders. Same diving, but what a difference. Take Roatan. There is absolutely no need to do a Bay Islands liveaboard, unless it is being moved 200 miles in a week. Roatan is best seen from a land based dive op. There are a lot of reasons to move beyond the lowest common denominator experience, albeit the most expensive and best marketed... thus the "most popular and best known" to US and Canadian divers.
My favorite (by far) land based dive op there is
Galapagos Diving Day Tours - Land based dive site
See a report at
Doc 's Galapagos Trip 2002 (I promise to update it, but it is largely still on point)
You can also save 40 to 50+% of the overall trip costs, land based vs. liveaboard. Something to consider.
