Many Galapagos tours stop by the "Post Office Bay" on Floreana Island. The "post office" consists of a barrel on a stick in the volcanic rocky shore of one of the islands. The barrel was originally placed during the early 1800s by a sailor from a whaling ship, so that sea-faring travelers could leave correspondence in the barrel, and remove for delivery any correspondence left in the barrel addressed to their destination city. The mail would be delivered by hand.
We visited the barrel on Christmas when I was in the Galapagos- here is a pic of the barrel (on a stick with a pitched roof), our guide, Jon, and some of the other passengers from my "cruise"-- the German girls, Veronica and Eva, on far right, then moving left- the Swiss guy, Marcel, Jon, and my Swedish roommate, Marie. The barrel and acommpanying signs have been "decorated" by visitors over years...
Today the tradition of leaving mail and hand-delivering other people's mail continues! I left a card for my family in Albuquerque, but didn't find any mail to retrieve for the state of New Mexico. I wondered how long it would be before my family would receive my note~!I have sent various things from Ecuador back to the states (actually just postcards and letters), and the fastest the letter has ever arrived was 2 weeks. The slowest letter delivery took over 2 months!!~!
My family received the letter I left in the barrel within, drum roll please......: approximately 15 days~! Too bad their aren't barrels posted all over the country, I wouldn't have to pay postage, AND things would travel faster!
No comments:
Post a Comment