Floreana Island
Today we had a full day of activities; we started our day with a pre-breakfast activity to visit a white sandy beach, which is one of the most important nesting grounds for the Pacific green sea turtles. This time of year all the Galápagos reptiles are taking advantage of the good weather conditions in order to nest. Reptiles had evolved to survive since they are babies with no parental care at all, once the eggs are deposited on beaches they are incubated by our tropical sun for about 80 days. From the very beginning, the babies have to run to the ocean in order to survive; unfortunately they have a big population of natural predators, such as frigate birds, herons, and some ocean predators as well. From all the eggs being laid by every female, probably one or two percent will reach adult ages.
Punta Cormorant is a very interesting place. We disembarked on a green sandy beach and walked to a white sandy beach, crossing a brackish lagoon— a very important place to spot flamingos. Mother Nature plays a very important role here: every 28 days, the moon and sun line up with our planet, causing the spring tides, a bit higher than average tides. The brackish lagoon fills with sea water containing lots of microscopic organisms—food for many shore birds. This morning we spotted a few of them arriving from someplace else within the archipelago.
Later, we continued our activities at Champion Island, with a Zodiac ride to search for the elusive Floreana mockingbird, and a deep-water snorkel that was at its best, with many different kinds of fish and Galápagos sea lions.
For the afternoon we offered a Zodiac ride to a place known as “La loberia,” which means sea lion rookery, followed by a visit to the famous Post Office barrel, which was used by whalers as a link of communication with their families on the old continent. Some of our guests collected postcards and letters from other visitors, to hand-deliver them once back at home, making it possible to keep this old tradition alive.
