Our Galapagos tour was sandwiched between visits to Mindo & Quito Ecuador. We flew into Quito and spent a couple of days in Mindo prior to embarking on the Queen Beatriz for 8 days. After the Galapagos tour, we spent a couple of days in Quito, the capital city of Ecuador.
The altitude in Quito is close to 9,000 feet and we experienced 'altitude sickness'. We first noticed it when we landed at the airport and headed for the luggage carousel. It wasn't very long before we realized we were breathless as we tried to keep up with the group. One of the guests woke up to go to the bathroom during the night, and fainted. Altitude sickness was not a nice feeling, constant headaches and feeling like one would pass out. We found ourselves constantly taking deep breaths as though we were experiencing air hunger. We did not have any problems in Mindo as it was half the altitude. Experiencing altitude sickness was not related to age as some young and very fit guests also had problems with air hunger & headaches. If I were to go to the Galapagos Islands again, I would fly into Guayaquil and take the plane from there. Mindo was half the altitude so it was not a problem.