Floreana Island
After navigating all night from Isabela Island, we arrived at Floreana Island early this morning. This was the first inhabited island; however has the smallest human population on the entire archipelago. We went to famous Post Office Bay in search of a wooden barrel which contains letters and post cards left there by earlier visitors. Our goal was to look amongst these letters and pick up the ones with destinations close to our homes, with the intention of delivering this mail personally once we return. We do this to continue with the oldest mail system on this side of the Pacific, just as the whalers use to do.
After this fun visit ended, we returned aboard to start navigating again; this time we headed towards Champion Islet, which for us is one of the most amazing snorkeling sites. This is also home to the Floreana mockingbird. This morning we had many playful sea lions and large schools of fish, great visibility and nice sun.
This afternoon we landed on Punta Cormorant, where we had a great walk; this was a great afternoon full of surprises. We encountered several female Pacific green sea turtles resting on the shore, basking, and we watched them quietly from a good distance. We marveled at to opportunity to observe them on land, as well as sighting diamond stingrays swimming close to the shore. We also had a nice time observing flamingoes feeding; some of them came so close we could hear them feeding, there were also several mating Galápagos painted locusts.
We finished our afternoon with a gorgeous sunset.
After navigating all night from Isabela Island, we arrived at Floreana Island early this morning. This was the first inhabited island; however has the smallest human population on the entire archipelago. We went to famous Post Office Bay in search of a wooden barrel which contains letters and post cards left there by earlier visitors. Our goal was to look amongst these letters and pick up the ones with destinations close to our homes, with the intention of delivering this mail personally once we return. We do this to continue with the oldest mail system on this side of the Pacific, just as the whalers use to do.
After this fun visit ended, we returned aboard to start navigating again; this time we headed towards Champion Islet, which for us is one of the most amazing snorkeling sites. This is also home to the Floreana mockingbird. This morning we had many playful sea lions and large schools of fish, great visibility and nice sun.
This afternoon we landed on Punta Cormorant, where we had a great walk; this was a great afternoon full of surprises. We encountered several female Pacific green sea turtles resting on the shore, basking, and we watched them quietly from a good distance. We marveled at to opportunity to observe them on land, as well as sighting diamond stingrays swimming close to the shore. We also had a nice time observing flamingoes feeding; some of them came so close we could hear them feeding, there were also several mating Galápagos painted locusts.
We finished our afternoon with a gorgeous sunset.
