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Fun fact; this entire trip was booked last minute. Like SUPER last minute. As in, I booked the flights to Ecuador two days before departure, and the flights from Quito to Galapagos the day before (this was the only regret I had as it went up by 2x in the span of a few days). Other than overpaying for the Quito->Galapagos portion, I would say it worked out super well booking everything last minute.
Airbnbs were aplenty, and you could easily find a comfortable 2-bedroom house in Santa Cruz for ~$50 USD per night. Tours were easily bookable the day before, at 20-50% off depending on how much the company wanted to fill their spots. Kids usually also got a discount for tours on top of that!
All in, this trip ended up being much cheaper than our previous trips to Costa Rica or Hawaii, and was so different from anything we’ve ever seen before. There was wildlife at every corner – we had to try hard to not accidentally step on or bump elbows with a sea lion or an iguana!
There are two main ways for exploring the Galapagos islands; you can either do a multi-day liveaboard tour, or a land-based tour. Many of the liveaboards have a minimum age (the lowest I saw was 6+, but many were much higher than that), so this option was out of the question for us with a baby. With a land-based tour you have a lot more control and options with kids. Pretty much all day-tours will allow you to bring an infant onboard at no charge!
Tours can be long – 6 to 7 hours, so make sure your kiddo is able to handle such a long day out in the water. Our baby was able to nap on the boat or just push nap time to after we got back and it worked out. We took turns sitting with our 1yo on the boat, while the other parent snorkeled with the older kids (8 & 6).
On one tour we actually managed to get her to nap on the boat bench and were able to both go snorkeling with the older kids while a crew member kept an eye on her. We were always within eye sight and earshot so we could return to the boat the moment we heard her. Most tour companies will have kids snorkel gear, and some of the better companies will also have child wetsuits.
What to pack for a trip to the Galapagos with Kids
We’re extremely light packers and try to bring as little as possible – the less stuff you bring, the less things there are to keep track of. We usually try to get away with just two carryons total for clothes and gear for the 5 of us, a camera bag, and then whatever small personal items the kids want to grab.
For this trip in particular, we brought just two UV shirts per person as the sun is extremely strong at the equator. We all practically lived in these shirts all day, and did not have to reapply that much sunscreen. We also only grabbed one pair of shoes each, specifically our favorite Keen hiking sandals and a couple pairs of shorts and long pants for mosquitos.
The one thing I always get right before an international trip is an international e-sim. We typically go with Airalo as it’s super easy to install and has worked really well for us around the world.
For underwater, we bring our GoPro Hero 13 with an underwater case and dome. For our regular camera gear, check out what’s in our camera backpack here.
Is it worth it to go to the Galapagos with Kids?
Based on our personal experience – absolutely resounding YES! Though it does depend on some factors. I used to think we need to push off this trip until the kids are much older due to cruise restrictions. That was until I realized that it’s possible to do an entirely land-based trip! While it’s true that most cruises and live-aboard tours have age restrictions, a DIY land-based tour does not have such restrictions. In fact, our baby was welcome everywhere and free of charge.
Restrictions aside, I would encourage parents to wait until the kids are able to snorkel. While it’s totally possible to enjoy the trip with kids in tow, I think they would get so much more out of it if they’re able to see the underwater world for themselves as well. Our kids were 6 & 8 and have snorkeled many times before, so they were familiar and so excited to swim with all the fish, sharks, sea lions and iguanas. You could of course forego the boat tours, but I think it would be a shame to go all the way to the Galapagos and not do any boat tours!
Logistics of getting to and around Galapagos with Kids
The only way to fly into Galapagos is either from Quito or Guayaquil. This is an easy 2 hour flight and usually goes for about $200 USD. Booking on the spot from Ecuador vs booking from the US is the same price, and I’ve never seen it go on sale so just go for the best price you see, as soon as you’re committed.
Once you’re in the Galapagos, you cannot rent a car and will be relying on either boat tours, ferries, buses, taxis, or walking. We brought our carseats but I wish we hadn’t – we ended up lugging them around with us for no reason and couldn’t use them in most places. Half the taxis don’t have seatbelts to secure the carseats, and you can get by with public transport, ferry or walking.
Getting from the main airport to Puerto Ayora (where you’ll likely be staying) is a bit of a dance. Once you land and pay your entrance fees ($200 for adults, $100 per child) you’ll be taking a short bus to a ferry, then transferring to a 10 minute ferry, and then taking a 40min bus or taxi to the main town. The whole process takes about an hour and while it sounds arduous, it’s not too bad once you start seeing your first glimpses of wildlife at every turn.
We had an iguana greet us at the airport, tons of crabs and sea lions at the ferry dock, two sea turtles on the 10 minute ferry, and then some tortoise sightings on the bus into town. It was like going on a mini safari (while lugging all your stuff with you).
Here’s what our Galapagos with kids itinerary looked like
There are 4 inhabited islands on the Galapagos – Santa Cruz (the main island), Isabela, San Cristobal and Floreana. There are flights to mainland Ecuador only from Santa Cruz and San Cristobal. You can travel between Santa Cruz, Isabela and San Cristobal by a puddle jumper or ferry, while Floreana is only reachable by ferry.
Given the complexities of transferring between the islands, we decided to just pick two and break up our trip into 5 nights on Santa Cruz and 4 nights on Isabela. Santa Cruz has a lot more tour options, food options, and a medical clinic, while Isabela is a bit more remote with less of these options available.
Day 1 – Tortuga Bay and El Chato Ranch
Since we didn’t have any tours booked for our first day, we decided to focus on island activities. Tortuga Bay is a beautiful beach relatively close to Puerto Ayora and accessible via a long walk (~40mins) or a 20min ferry from the main pier. We packed up enough food and water for a half day visit to Tortuga Bay and set out on the long hike to the beach. It gets hot the moment the sun rises, so there’s really no escaping the heat – this walk will be hot! But once you get there, it is absolutely stunning. The most pristine white sand beach I’ve ever seen, and barely any people in sight.
There are marine iguanas going for a swim in the ocean, sea lions basking in the sun and baby reef sharks swimming in the shallow water. While you can’t actually swim in Tortuga Bay beach due to strong currents, theres another protected beach just behind Tortuga Bay that’s great for swimming and cooling off. You can snorkel here though the visibility is quite poor.
If you’re planning on taking the water taxi back to Puerto Ayora, make sure to find the ticket seller on the beach in advance to secure a spot on the boat. They walk up and down the beach wearing a uniform and you can pay cash to get your name down for the taxi. When we went it was $10 per adult and $5 for kids, free for infants.
For the second half of the day we took a taxi to El Chato Ranch, which is a Giant Tortoise Reserve. Here you can walk around the park getting close to the tortoises and learning about their history.
There’s lots of organized tours that do half day trips to “Santa Cruz Highlands”, which include a tortoise ranch, lava tubes, and craters. Those tours run at around 30-50$ USD per person. We just hired a taxi for 40$ for all of us to take us around all of these pit stops and wait for us at each stop. Personally I would’ve been fine to skip the craters as I’ve been to many volcanoes before, but the tortoise ranch was pretty fun and the girls loved exploring the lava tubes which were included in the entrance fee to the ranch.
You don’t necessarily need to go to a tortoise ranch to see giant tortoises – you can see them pretty much anywhere in the Santa Cruz highlands. Just make sure to stay 2m away from then when you’re taking pictures of them so that they don’t feel stressed and threatened!
Day 2 – Playa El Garrapatero
This was another laid back day, but we made sure to book a tour for the following day. I heard Playa El Garrapatero was a really nice beach and that it was possible to see some flamingoes here so we decided to check it out. This is a 30 minute drive in a taxi, and there are no facilities or food at the beach so we brought enough for a half day. You should also arrange pick up with the same taxi that brought you there, otherwise it’ll be a long trek back!
The beach was absolutely beautiful, but unfortunately we didn’t see too much wildlife here other than a handful of swimming iguanas. No luck with flamingoes here!
For the second half of the day, we went to the main pier and boardwalk to watch all the wildlife.
At night, the boardwalk is lit up and you can see tons of baby sharks swimming around in the light. The girls did not want to leave, it was so fun spotting all the fish in the water! It was also really cool to watch the pelicans hunting for fish and diving into the water for their prey.
Day 3 – Santa Fe Island tour
I’d been looking forward to this tour for a while – swimming with sea lions, snorkeling and a secret beach stop! We decided to go with Guiding Galapagos for the tour. It didn’t seem like it mattered too much who you booked with, as every tour we went on had people from different agencies pooled together into a single boat. It’s possible this only happens with last minute bookings as tour companies are trying to fill up a boat and split the profit. Either way, the tour company you go with will outfit you with snorkel gear and wetsuit (optional) the night before the tour and then meet you in the morning to load the gear onto the boat.
“Secret Beach” stop on the way to Santa Fe Island 
Santa Fe Island snorkeling
This particular tour included three stops; a “secret beach” and two separate snorkel spots. The secret beach stop (a beach right next to Garrapatero where we were the day before) was absolutely stunning, with lots of baby sharks and iguanas swimming in the water. It was a wet landing, so you got off the boat right into the water. Our 1yo loved swimming here and watching all the fish!
The second stop was a snorkeling stop where we saw tons of beautiful tropical fish, turtles and rays. The water is typically pretty calm here and perfect for littles. It worked out pretty well that our 1yo fell asleep just as we got to this spot, so we were able to leave her on the boat with one of the crew members while we all snorkeled together. We were within ear shot and eye-sight to be able to get right back on the boat if she woke up!
The third stop was by far everyone’s favorite – we got to finally snorkel and swim with sea lions!
Sea Lions at Santa Fe island 
Sea Lion at Santa Fe island
Day 4 was unfortunately a complete write off as we had torrential downpours the entire day, to the point where our airbnb flooded and the power went out in most of the town.
If you have extra time in Santa Cruz there are plenty of tours you can do. Some of the ones I was looking into were North Seymour Island, Pinzon Island and La Fé, Bartolome and a couple of others. Each island offers something a little bit different, but they all involve some amount of snorkeling and/or hiking.
The tours are all between $150-200pp. We have also gotten 20% off discounts on all tours as we booked all of them last minute! On top of all this – kids are usually discounted as well.
Day 5 – transfer to Isabela
There are two ways to travel between islands; a ferry or a puddle jumper plane. The ferry is roughly 2 hours and can be quite rough if the swells are high. We had a pretty smooth ride though we did take dramamine as a precaution as we have heard lots of horror stories.
Isabela Island has a completely different vibe than Santa Cruz. It’s a lot less touristy, less crowded, the main town is on an absolutely stunning beach and the town itself is very small. It felt like there was even MORE wildlife here, which I didn’t think was possible! The main pier is completely overrun with sea lions, to the point where it’s sometimes hard to get across to the other side
We found a really cute hotel right on the main beach in Puerto Villamil called Drake Inn. It was the perfect place to have access to a huge, completely empty, white sand beach with turtle nesting sites sprinkled all along.
Day 6 – Tortuga Island Tour and Tintoreras Kayak Tour
We read that it was possible to see giant manta rays on the Tortuga Island tour so we signed up for it. Unfortunately this was one of our least favorite tours! Between the kids not getting snorkels or wetsuits (even though that was supposed to be included in the tour), to the ocean being super rough in this area, and near zero visibility, I did not enjoy this tour at all. The best part of the tour was when we passed a huge pod of golden rays in Tintoreras on the way to Tortuga Island.
For the second part of the day we booked a kayak tour of Tintoreras, and that turned out to be super awesome! We got to kayak around the bay and see sea lions, penguins, turtles, boobies and pelicans. It was really easy kayaking, and we were even able to fit 2 adults and 3 kids on two double kayaks.
Another awesome tour I was considering was the Tintoreras snorkeling tour. This is an easy half day tour into the bay, so just short 10 minute boat ride and you get to snorkel in the same area where we kayaked – so high likelyhood of swimming with penguins, sea lions and turtles!
Day 7 – Flamingos and snorkeling at Concha de Perla
Since the previous day was a “turbo travel” day as Danny likes to call it, we decided to take it super easy today and not book any tours. Luckily, there’s still plenty of things to see and do at your own laid back pace.
After a complete bust looking for flamingos at El Garrapatero, I was so thrilled to find out that there’s a high chance of seeing flamingos in Isabela. Luckily, there are a handful of flamingos who are permanently parked a the Flamingo Lagoon right in town. This was the easiest wildlife photography I’ve ever done in my life.
Then we took a taxi to the pier so we could try out snorkeling at Concha de Perla. This is a small and protected ocean-water lagoon where you can swim with sea lions, rays, starfish, iguanas and fish. I was glad we brought our own snorkeling gear so we could have it accessible at any point, but there are also plenty of shops that offer daily rentals for very cheap ($5 USD).
In the afternoon Danny rented a surf board and tried some of the surf along the main beach in Puerto Vilamill.
Day 8 – Los Tuneles snorkeling tour
I think this may have been my favorite tour of the whole trip, because we got to snorkel with PENGUINS!!
When I heard there was a possibility of snorkeling with penguins, I had to convince Danny to give it a shot. This tour stops at two different snorkeling spots; one to swim with penguins, and the other to swim with turtles, rays and sea horses. At this point we had already been spoiled with tons of turtles and rays so I was just really excited to see some penguins – and we did! These adorable birds are so incredibly fast in the water, and not scared of humans at all. I almost ran into one by accident while I was snorkeling!
There’s also a quick 30 minute stop at the lava tunnels where you can walk around and see all the cool lava formations. It’s really fun to watch how the boats navigate these narrow lava tunnels!
That’s it!
Isabela was definitely everyone’s favorite island and I wish we had a little bit more time here! It had a very relaxed vibe, lots of different animals and birds that you can’t easily see on Santa Cruz, really great beaches and fantastic snorkeling.
I don’t think we missed out on anything by doing a land-based tour with daily excursions. A turtle is a turle, no matter where you see it, and I think we got to see pretty much every animal we had hoped for aside from hammerhead sharks. Those are primarily in San Cristobal and I came to terms with not seeing them when I picked Isabela over San Cristobal. For next time!
So, how much does it cost to go to the Galapagos with kids?
There are many ways to explore the Galapagos and the cost can vary wildly. I’ll cover the costs of doing an a-la-carte style DIY trip, and the ranges for everything. This will not include flights to mainalnd Ecuador as that can vary significantly based on your departure airport.
Starting with the non-negotiables:
- Flight to the Galapagos from mainland Ecuador: $200 round trip per person (lap infant in our case)
- Entrance Fee into the Galapagos: $200 per adult, $100 per child (infants are free!)
- 2bd Airbnb in Santa Cruz: $50-180 per night
- 2bd Airbnb in Isabela: $100-150 per night
For a 10 day, 9 night trip for our family, this came out to roughly $3000 as a baseline just for getting to and living on the islands. On the lower end with cheaper airbnbs, this could get down to $2000.
Then there there’s the fun and small logistics items:
- Ferry to Isabela: $35 one way per person. Infants are free.
- Tours: $50-200 per person, depending on the tour. Kids are discounted, infants free.
- Taxis around town: $1-5 per ride
We did three boat tours and one kayak tour, and the ferry, which came out to about 1700 ($600 + $450 + $350 + $180). Groceries were pretty cheap on the island, so between that and taxis, we can round this out to about $5000 total for the 10 days for 5 people with all tours and activities included! We also rented a surf board for a few hours on some of the days ($10 per rental) and snorkel gear for one of the kids ($5).
Of course you can do as many tours as you want/can afford which will change your price, as well as pick more budget friendly accommodations but I think this is a fantastic price for a 10 day Galapagos trip! Cruises generally start at $5k+ per person, so this was a much more reasonable way to explore for us!