Come Explore Two Different Worlds
(Galapagos Islands and Sacred Valley of the Inca)
In late April, Ann and Farley Olander traveled to destinations far removed from their usual trips. They returned home, however, filled with the mystique of the two magical places they visited: the Galapagos Islands – 600 miles off the coast of Ecuador – and the Sacred Valley of the Inca, between Cusco and Machu Picchu in Peru.
The Olanders will present a program on their adventure at the October 4th meeting of the San Gorgonio Chapter at the San Bernardino County Museum, 2024 Orange Tree Lane, Redlands, near the California Street exit from Interstate 10. The meeting starts at 7:30 P.M.
During their Galapagos week aboard a small catamaran, the Olanders and eight other passengers learned from a naturalist who’d lived and worked there more than 30 years. In this natural laboratory, she led two to three daily excursions from wet or dry landings on 10 different islands/islets.
Wonder came alive for the Olanders by getting close-up to the wildlife – wildlife that evolved while isolated on the islands for millions of years. Fresh awareness came each time the naturalist pointed out plants or animals adapted to an island’s particular environment, like the Galapagos tortoises and Darwin’s finches.While snorkeling or walking on land, the Olanders found wildlife undaunted by their close presence, and they basked in the magic – whether near land or marine iguanas, playful sea lions, waved albatrosses tending their newborns, or courting blue-footed boobies and great frigate birds, the males of the latter strutting their inflated sacs to attract females – truly Enchanted Isles, another name for the Galapagos Islands.
Flying into Cusco plunged the Olanders into an equally enchanted world, that of the Inca. Here the couple planned and traveled on their own. Yet during four of those days, they hired personal guides who made all the difference. Familiar with their Quechua roots as well as Inca history, they took the Olanders along back routes to learn about the Inca ruins, their people and beliefs, interspersed with occasional stories from a guide’s own heritage. Their presence gave a taste for the area’s spiritual culture that the Olanders are still trying to assimilate.
One guide led them all day, often crosscountry – hiking above the village of Chinchero for better views of 18,000 to 20,000-foot mountains and to sacred Inca sites nearby, but also to scenes of local farmers harvesting potatoes and corn in the high plateau from Chinchero to Moray with its concentric terraces, spiraling 500 feet into the ground where Inca reportedly experimented plant adaptability at varying climates.
The above scenes add to those from Pisac’s market and its Inca ruins, the fortress/temple remains of Sacsayhuaman and Ollantaytambo plus the wonders at Machu Picchu. Some 600 years ago Inca built these structures without machines or mortar, assembling stones seamlessly with some blocks weighing more than 300 tons. Aligning notches in the stonework with the sun’s rays on the June 21st, their winter solstice, must have included a bit of magic or pre-ordained mystery. Hiking above Machu Picchu on the steep, centuries old Inca trails of stone both exhilarated – and humbled Ann and Farley, ending their saga in two different worlds.
Longtime Sierra Club members of the Los Serranos Group, the Olanders authored the 2005 award-winning photo-essay, Call of Mountains, the Beauty and Legacy of Southern California’s San Jacinto, San Bernardino and San Gabriel Mountain
