Isabela & Fernandina Island
Today we had an early optional wake up call at 6:15am to observe a huge rock; it looked as if it were floating on the surface of the Pacific Ocean. From the distance it looked empty and lifeless, but when the National Geographic Endeavour got closer, our guests were astonished by the thousands and thousands of seabirds living in that a place! This rock is their home. Galápagos shear waters, storm petrels, red bill tropic birds, boobies, noddy terns, and Galápagos petrels were some of the inhabitants of the rock.
After crossing the equator line, we spotted two humpback whales, probably a mum and her calf. These cetaceans come from the Antarctic area looking for warmer waters to give birth, and after three or four months they go back to their feeding grounds.
In our second activity we explored by Zodiac Bolivar channel, which is in between Fernandina and Isabela Islands. This time Mola mola were everywhere as never before. During our water activities the bay was full of turtles, and two Pacific Ocean sun fish remained still for over thirty minutes to be cleaned by king angel fish and Mexican hog fish as well; that was a good example of mutualism between two different species.
In the afternoon we set foot in a pristine environment with not much vegetation. This is explained by the fact that Fernandina is a very young active volcano; however some pioneering plants have made their way to the island and probably in a couple of thousand years more will make it less hostile for the fauna of the Galápagos archipelago.
Due to the location of Fernandina it receives a very rich upwelling from deep water, and as a result of that there are plenty of green algae which support the largest population of marine iguanas and pacific green sea turtles.
Today was definitely an amazing day.
