Before we left for Galapagos, I had the chance of a short sightseeing in Quito, the historic main capital of Ecuador. Since Ecuador is famous for countless species of orchids and tropical birds, I additionally had booked a day trip into the primeval cloud forest of the Tandayapa Reserve to see some hummingbirds, including a short stop at the Pahoma Orchids Reserve. Focusing mainly on Galapagos, I had no multi flash setup brought on this trip which is needed to properly capture the humms in flight. In the limited period of our stay I could only get an impression of the seemingly endless species there and capture some basic shots by just using a single o580 EX II flash with fresnel adapter. In any case, this area is well worth coming back one day. On our return from Galapagos we stopped over in Guayaquil, the second largest town in Ecuador. We bridged the time gap by a short city tour.

Most photos were captured with the Canon 1Ds Mark III, some indoors and night shots also with my old Canon 10D. For landscapes I preferably used the 24-105mm/f 4.0 IS, 16-35mm or 24-70mm/2 2.8 lenses, while the macros were taken with the 100mm/ f.2.8 prime and ring flash.