Santa Cruz Island
This week we have been part of a film production; we have seen how things work behind the scenes, we have walked in famous footsteps as the team from National Geographic Television prepare their documentary about the most important visitor to the islands, Charles Darwin.
This special will air on February 9, 2009, to celebrate 200 years since Darwin’s birth and the 150th anniversary of On the Origin of Species. The purpose of the production is to follow the evolution of Darwin’s thinking, going to places he visited during the five year voyage of the HMS Beagle. They hope to show the diversity of landscapes as well as life as they travel from the Galápagos to Patagonia, the south Pacific Islands and New Zealand, as Darwin did from December 27, 1831 to October 2, 1836.
For Geoffrey Luck, the producer, the biggest surprise when he came to Galápagos was that on each island he could encounter a variety of species, making it hard to pick-out just one to film. He had the idea that there were specific sites for certain species, one mostly for frigates, and one for boobies, and so on; but today on Santa Cruz Island, for example, it was the tortoises, but also eight of the thirteen species of Darwin’s finches, flycatchers, and mockingbirds.
The host of the show, Professor Armand Leroi, had no idea that you could see all these animals at such close range. When long ago he had watched a BBC production showing a sea lion grabbing the tail of a marine iguana, he thought the footage would have taken months to capture; but during one of his first visits, he saw the same behavior before even landing on the beach.
For our guests it is also fascinating to see how a documentary is produced, how they spend hours on the same spot, before the sun rises and after it is gone. And we have learned so much from the vast knowledge they have about Darwin, details of his life, work and voyage around the world.
This is one of the privileges of traveling with Lindblad Expeditions. This week our ship National Geographic Polaris has been the platform for a documentary production. Now, somehow, we all feel part of it.
This week we have been part of a film production; we have seen how things work behind the scenes, we have walked in famous footsteps as the team from National Geographic Television prepare their documentary about the most important visitor to the islands, Charles Darwin.
This special will air on February 9, 2009, to celebrate 200 years since Darwin’s birth and the 150th anniversary of On the Origin of Species. The purpose of the production is to follow the evolution of Darwin’s thinking, going to places he visited during the five year voyage of the HMS Beagle. They hope to show the diversity of landscapes as well as life as they travel from the Galápagos to Patagonia, the south Pacific Islands and New Zealand, as Darwin did from December 27, 1831 to October 2, 1836.
For Geoffrey Luck, the producer, the biggest surprise when he came to Galápagos was that on each island he could encounter a variety of species, making it hard to pick-out just one to film. He had the idea that there were specific sites for certain species, one mostly for frigates, and one for boobies, and so on; but today on Santa Cruz Island, for example, it was the tortoises, but also eight of the thirteen species of Darwin’s finches, flycatchers, and mockingbirds.
The host of the show, Professor Armand Leroi, had no idea that you could see all these animals at such close range. When long ago he had watched a BBC production showing a sea lion grabbing the tail of a marine iguana, he thought the footage would have taken months to capture; but during one of his first visits, he saw the same behavior before even landing on the beach.
For our guests it is also fascinating to see how a documentary is produced, how they spend hours on the same spot, before the sun rises and after it is gone. And we have learned so much from the vast knowledge they have about Darwin, details of his life, work and voyage around the world.
This is one of the privileges of traveling with Lindblad Expeditions. This week our ship National Geographic Polaris has been the platform for a documentary production. Now, somehow, we all feel part of it.
