“Watch where you’re stepping!” says our naturalist guide, Nikolas. I flinch. Slowly but surely I am learning the proper rules of etiquette in the Galápagos National Park and Marine Reserve as we carefully wind our way along narrow trails, some of them treacherous and slippery from water and shards of hard lava. “You see,” whispers Nikolas, “you might have stepped on their nests if you wandered off the trail.”

In April 2001, John and Silvana Nicholls, today owners and operators of Vanuatu Hotels, arrived in Vanuatu to launch and manage a resort on the island of Tanna. They immediately declared it a bird sanctuary. They also banned coconut crab from their menu. The resort became the island’s de facto animal refuge.