Española Island
I awoke this morning watching a flock of shearwaters, through my window, that were flying towards Española Island, the oldest island in Galápagos. After breakfast we disembarked on the south western point of Española, at Punta Suarez. We are in the middle of the sea lion birthing season, and there were a number of pups just a couple weeks old, playing on the beach along the trail.
Our guests were fascinated with the variety of creatures that we found at the landing site; a few meters from the sea lions we found a hoard (that is what an iguana aggregation is called!) of colorful marine iguanas resting on the sand. We saw 3 different species of Darwin’s finches, nesting Nazca boobies, and we ended up at a colony of endemic waved albatross. The highlight on today’s outing was watching the baby albatrosses that were trying to walk among the lava rocks.
These appealing birds spend the first two or three months of their lives eating, resting and enjoying a lazy life. They don’t get any exercise, and now when they first try to walk, they waddle in an attempt to keep their balance and their bulky body heaves from side to side in a very funny manner. It is hard to believe that in the next two months they have to learn to fly! The albatross spend 9 or 10 months of the year in Galápagos. In late December or early January both the adults and the young that have only recently learned to fly, leave the island. They will spend the next few months feeding along the Humbolt Current off the coast of South America.
I must not overlook our afternoon exploration of the under water world at the famous Roca Tortuga in Gardner Bay. We saw a great number of colorful fish, sea stars, sea lions, and marine turtles. Wonderful day!
I awoke this morning watching a flock of shearwaters, through my window, that were flying towards Española Island, the oldest island in Galápagos. After breakfast we disembarked on the south western point of Española, at Punta Suarez. We are in the middle of the sea lion birthing season, and there were a number of pups just a couple weeks old, playing on the beach along the trail.
Our guests were fascinated with the variety of creatures that we found at the landing site; a few meters from the sea lions we found a hoard (that is what an iguana aggregation is called!) of colorful marine iguanas resting on the sand. We saw 3 different species of Darwin’s finches, nesting Nazca boobies, and we ended up at a colony of endemic waved albatross. The highlight on today’s outing was watching the baby albatrosses that were trying to walk among the lava rocks.
These appealing birds spend the first two or three months of their lives eating, resting and enjoying a lazy life. They don’t get any exercise, and now when they first try to walk, they waddle in an attempt to keep their balance and their bulky body heaves from side to side in a very funny manner. It is hard to believe that in the next two months they have to learn to fly! The albatross spend 9 or 10 months of the year in Galápagos. In late December or early January both the adults and the young that have only recently learned to fly, leave the island. They will spend the next few months feeding along the Humbolt Current off the coast of South America.
I must not overlook our afternoon exploration of the under water world at the famous Roca Tortuga in Gardner Bay. We saw a great number of colorful fish, sea stars, sea lions, and marine turtles. Wonderful day!
