Isabela Day Tour 

Isabela Island is the largest of the Galapagos Archipelago measuring 120 km long and greater in size than all the other islands combined, giving an area of 4,670 square kilometers (1,803 sq. mi). It is four times larger than Santa Cruz Island which is the second largest. Originally it was named as Albemarle after the Duke of Albemarle. The island straddles the equatorial line and is one of the youngest located on the Western edge of the archipelago, near to the Galápagos hotspot. This is the reason why here we find some of the most active volcanoes of America: Alcedo, Cerro Azul, Darwin, Sierra Negra, Darwin and Wolf (the highest on Isabela with 1707 m/5,600 ft). Here, we also find the Ecuador volcano which is considered extinct and together with Wolf volcano, lie on the equatorial line.

Isabela is one of the fantastic examples of the geological events that created the islands, including uplifts at Urbina Bay and the Bolivar Channel, tuff cones at Tagus Cove, and pumice on Alcedo and Sierra Negra volcano which has the second largest crater on the world after Ngorongoro in Tanzania. The approximately 2000 residents of Isabela make their living by farming, fishing and mainly by tourism. Most of them are in Puerto Villamil, a small coastal city on the southern part of the island. Charles Darwin visited Tagus Cove in 1835. In 1893, Antonio Gil, a well-known citizen from Guayaquil, arrived to Galapagos and after visiting the other islands. He decided to establish and colonize southern Isabela founding the town of Puerto Villamil, and later the place now known as Santa Tomás in the highlands.