Floreana Island
Floreana Island is located in the south of the Galápagos Archipelago. First inhabited in the early 1800’s, it still hosts a small population of approximately 100 people. Our early morning outing today was a visit to the famous Post Office barrel, a 200 year old tradition, first established by whalers in 1793. Vessels would stop last at Post Office Bay just before leaving the Galápagos, and they would take letters left at the barrel that they could deliver upon arrival to their home countries. This was before the days of official postal service. The whalers are long gone from these waters, but visitors to the islands nowadays are welcome to leave their postcards in the barrel, continuing the tradition by taking others to hand-deliver them to their rightful addressees.
After breakfast, we were out again in our Zodiacs, in search of the unique Floreana mockingbird. This is a severely endangered species, only found on a couple of small satellite islands off Floreana. We were all fully successful in our quest, after which it was time to switch into snorkeling mode. We headed for Champion Islet, where dozens of young Galápagos sea lions were waiting for us. We can say that they were really playful and certainly fearless!
Some of our guests took the opportunity to appreciate Galápagos in a special way, by kayaking along the shoreline of Punta Cormorant, north of Floreana. Others just relaxed on the beautiful olivine beach, enjoying the company of a couple of feeding immature boobies, practicing their dives close to a group of swimmers!
And of course, we could not end this visit to Floreana without our walk towards the flamingo lagoon, behind the beach. Surrounded by wonderful scenery, we could observe dozens of greater flamingoes. These are said to be the pinkest flamingos in the wild, worldwide. Several of them were feeding, filtering the muddy waters of the lagoon, while others seemed to be involved in some pre-courtship behavior.
At the end of the walk, the beauty of a white-coralline beach took our breath away.
The sun was setting over the hills of Floreana, and it was time to leave the island to its wildlife. Today was certainly another day in paradise!
