Española Island
Early in the morning we arrived to Española Island; this is the oldest island in the archipelago and one of our favorites. This island has species of birds and plants found nowhere else in the world, as well as gorgeous beaches. We started our day on Gardner Bay where some of our guests went kayaking along the coast and conditions were perfect, nice gentle breeze, calm clear waters, and lots of birds, sea turtles, and sea lions to observe.
Later on the morning we collected our snorkeling gear and went deep water snorkeling, and we also headed to the beach where several Galápagos sea lions were found sleeping and playing while the youngest ones were suckling milk from their mothers. Since we had the right conditions some of our guests went swimming from the shore to the ship, and everyone made it the whole way without any assistance, even our youngest guests were cheerfully greeted as they arrived to our ship’s platform.
For our afternoon we headed towards Punta Suarez; we went ashore and after landing on a dock full of Galápagos sea lions we managed to get on the trail and began our walk. We found many juveniles Nazca boobies, some by themselves, and others with their parents. There were several females Galápagos marine iguanas nesting; we even saw a few fighting for a single spot on the ground to nest. The nesting grounds looked very crowded and no one but female marine iguanas were in it.
One of the greatest surprises for us was to observe a lonely Galápagos waved albatross flying towards the cliffs and it quickly disappeared from our sight and did not return again. This will be the first of the season, in just a couple more weeks the albatrosses will finally arrive and nest on this island.
After a great walk we jumped from the ship into the water to cool off a little bit. It was a perfect day in Galápagos.
