Isabela & Fernandina Island
After one of the longest navigations on board the National Geographic Endeavour, we woke up to admire an amazing rock known as “Roca Redonda” in the middle of nowhere. This is just the remnants of a huge shield volcano.
This rock is the home for thousands of sea birds such as shear waters, storm petrels, brown noddies, terns, boobies, frigates birds, tropic birds, brown pelicans and swallow tailed gulls. After circumnavigating for about 30 minutes, we continued our navigation toward Punta Vicente Roca, our next stop. A few bottle-nosed dolphins were jumping out of the water as a farewell for our guests.
This time our ship was ready to cross the Equatorial line from the North to the South hemisphere, and an invitation through our PA system was made to join us on the swimming pool deck, where King Neptune and his court appeared to remember a tradition from the old days.
Later on in the morning, a Zodiac ride was offered to explore the northwestern cost of Isabela Island. Two of the Galápagos flightless sea birds were spotted here: Galápagos penguins and flightless cormorants. The geology of this island is very impressive, confirming that it is very young and still active.
On our way back to the ship, a killer whale was spotted and we were close enough that everyone had a chance to take a picture, even with small non-professional cameras. To finish our morning, snorkeling in this area was offered to enjoy being close to turtles, penguins and cormorants.
Our final activity was on Fernandina Island. This time we walked over fresh lava flows, where colonization of plants is still in progress. This is an indication that this is really a new island born from the ocean floor just a few thousand years ago. Due to the cold nutrient-rich upwelling waters, the largest marine iguanas are found at this part of the archipelago. An interesting endemic lava cactus forest was also spotted on our walk.
