Bryan Elkus

Category: Travel

  • Kiteboarding the Oregon Coast

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    After arriving into Portland late on Monday night, Jason Slezak picked me up and we headed out to meet up and party with Joby. We had a really fun night. The next morning Chris Stuckey, Brandon Scheid and I hit up the skate park. We then grabbed some lunch and got a call from Julien Fillion & Tekko.

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    We made the decision to head out to the Oregon Coast. Three hours later we arrived to a hazy beautiful coastline. Tekko and Julien were already out kiting by the time we arrived. It was rather chilly but perfect 12m winds and overhead rollers. We were out there until dark.

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  • From Hatteras to MI with Planes

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    Saturday, I dropped Mel off at the airport then went to go hang with DL in Virginia Beach. That place was packed with tourists. We biked out to the beach to check the surf and couldn’t see the waves because of the entire beach was covered in umbrellas. After a great taco dinner, we headed to the bars. I was up early to catch a flight home.

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    We meet up with my family and cousins out at the lake for some bbq and boating. After a very relaxing day we cruised back to the house for the rest of the evening.

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    Monday I got the have breakfast with the grandparents then drove up to Traverse City!

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  • Galapagos Photo Book

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    My new photo book arrived. This book is from my trip to the Galapagos. The book turned out AMAZING, the best one yet! It’s a massive 300 full color 11×13” pages. It’s as close as you can get with out going!
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  • The Ecuador & Galapagos Trip

    After 11 days in the Galapagos and 2 days in the Ecuador mainland, I have seen amazing creatures and landscapes. It was a terrific trip. We combed many of the Islands in the Galapagos, hiked, swam and snorkeled. Check out all the action:

    Ecuador Quito Day 1
    Galapagos : San Cristobal
    Galapagos : Espanola Island
    Galapagos : Santa Cruz & Rabida Islands
    Galapagos : Bachas Beach & Cerro Brujo
    Galapagos : Bartholomew & James Island
    Galapagos : Fernandina Island
    Galapagos : North Seymour & Santa Cruz Islands
    Ecuador : Otovalo Region

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    See All the Photos HERE.

  • Ecuador : Otovalo Region

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    We meet up with our guide Oz again early in the morning in Quito. From there we drove about two hours into the mountains to visit the Otovalo region. The first stop was to a place were they made figurines out of dough. After that we headed deeper into the mountain. We headed into the town and stopped at a great food and craft markets. It was an amazing experience and quite a sight to see.

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    After a great lunch we headed to a real shaman. She performed a ceremony on my dad, which was pretty unique to watch. It was something straight out of a National Geographic magazine. After she balances our energy with, herbs, scents, fire and alcohol we hit the road and went to a place were they made the famous weavings of Otovalo. The owner demonstrated how they made the different types of weavings. Then we headed back to Quito for dinner and a red eye back to the States.

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  • Galapagos : North Seymour & Santa Cruz Islands

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    We started the hiking out hiking around North Seymour Island. After seeing a bunch of sea lions, very large birds, and perfect waves, we headed back to the boat to get the snorkeling gear. We snorkeled down current for about an hour seeing all kinds of sea life. It was the best day of snorkeling we had. It was warm, clear and plenty of things to see.

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    After lunch we headed back out but this time we headed to the highlands of Santa Cruz Island? We drove 45 minutes up into the hills to try and find giant turtles in the wild. After some searching we found 2-3 of these massive creatures. We also got to see a tunnel created by a lava flow. It looked like someone took a massive tunneled and just started drilling to nowhere.

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  • Galapagos : Fernandina Island

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    We started the morning with a hike around Fernandia Island. We saw a bunch of iguanas, sea lions and birds. The landscape was very rocky and volcanic. After a long walk around the island we headed back to the boat.

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    After lunch we headed out to snorkel off the Coast of Isabella Island. There were hundreds of sea turtles in the area, but unfortunately, it was pretty hazy in the water due to the swell stirring up the sediment. It was very cool to swim with some 5-8 turtles at once! Then we got back in the dingy and motored around the island checking out the coastline.

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  • Galapagos : Bartholomew & James Island

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    Well today was probably the most demanding day thus far. It started with a long hike up to a lighthouse atop Bartholomew Island. There were some 350+ stairs and walkways traversing the mountain to the top.

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    After an amazing view of the surrounding islands we made our way down to the shore again. It was time for a swim. We grabbed our snorkeling gear and hit the water. I finally saw a white tip shark along with tons of other fish swimming by the volcanic island.

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    After lunch we went to Port Egas on James Island. There we walked for a while until we were again at the shore of volcanic rock. There we saw both regular and fur Sea Lions, crabs and Iguanas. It was a great hike around the shore on the way back.

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  • Galapagos : Bachas Beach & Cerro Brujo

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    Most of the cruise headed out today, which left only us on the excursion. We took a dingy over too Bachas Beach, Santa Cruz. We checked out some flamingos that were feeding in a pond. The white sandy beach was lined with sea turtle nests. We caught our first glimpse of a sea turtle in the ocean. There were some beautiful great blue herons and some large crabs on the beach.

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    We motored over to Santa Cruz to meet up with the cruise ship, had lunch and waited for the new guests to arrive. Grabbing the gear we headed out to Cerro Brujo to take a look around. This island was much different than the others. It almost looked like Hawaii a little. We saw a bunch of land iguanas. One even walked up to us on the trail, which was pretty neat seeing as how they are the size of a small dog.

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    As the sun was setting, we finished our hike with terrific light as I took pictures, we loaded the dingy and headed back to the boat for dinner.

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