Today, following the steps of Charles Darwin, we spent the day on Santiago Island. He visited this island for nine days so many of the species he saw and curiously analyzed, we may have seen today, too.
We started early with a disembarkation on Espumilla Beach. The waters are becoming warmer, the season is changing. We could see the first leaves starting to grow on the Palo Santo trees, and we saw as well some Pacific green sea turtles mating. The warm season that we are beginning is their mating season!
Snorkeling was a blast! With warmer waters than the last two days we enjoyed the time in the water! We found sea turtles and sharks, rays, and different small fish! We snorkeled into a cave where the light made the most beautiful combination of colors and contrasts…
The place we visited in the morning, Buccaneer’s Cove, gets its name from the many buccaneers, pirates, whalers, and others who have visited this island in the past. The reasons: freshwater and giant tortoises! Santiago suffered many changes during the 1700s and 1800s. Today this island is an iconic island for the conservation of Galápagos as many of the efforts of the National Park and the Charles Darwin Research Station have been directed to the restoration of this place.
The walk on Puerto Egas is one of the most beautiful walks of the week. In the afternoon we disembarked there, but the tide had gone really high! So high that our disembarkation beach was underwater! We observed the sea lions all conglomerate in the highest parts of the area! Sally Lightfoot crabs by the hundreds shared the same rocks! The area was amazing! We found some fur seals waking up to jump in the water from bridges of lava and after five minutes return to go back to sleep. And finally we enjoyed seeing several Galápagos sea lion pups playing in a field with tide pools—the game was so much fun that they paid scant attention to the marine iguanas and the Galápagos hawk that were on the same rock and walked over them several times!
What an amazing island!
