Special Note: Today's video features Eric Yang, the 2009 National Geographic Bee Champion. Eric's extraordinary knowledge of geography earned him this week-long expedition in the Galapagos Islands with Alex Trebek and the Jeopardy! crew. Try your hand at some Bee material: www.nationalgeographic.com/geobee.
Española Island
Today we visited the oldest island on the archipelago, Española Island. From the distance you see a flat eroded island, but millions of years ago this was a huge volcano. Today we find many species that have adapted to the specific conditions of the island; therefore endemism is very high here. The island has its endemic species of lava lizard and mocking bird. The marine iguana is endemic as a subspecies too. And during the cold season Española is the nesting site of a very special bird, the waved albatross.
We started our day at Punta Suarez to walk along a cliff. This area is full of life: sea birds such as blue footed boobies, Nazca boobies, swallow tailed gulls and pelicans. The area is also full of reptiles including marine iguanas, lizards and snakes, and of course our very charming Galápagos sea lions. Some of us got the chance to see the albatross which is the bird with the biggest wingspan in the Galápagos.
After our walk we navigated to Gardner Bay, a beautiful coralline sandy beach with hundreds of sea lions. Here, guests enjoyed both the land and marine ecosystems. Some had their first deep water snorkeling with a lot of fish and some sea lions, while others kayaked along the shore. Finally we all had a nice, calm walk on the beach.
We are leaving Española Island to our next destination, but I can still see in my mind the sea lion that came to play with us as we snorkeled. This memory will stay with us forever!
