Floreana Island
We started our day with a pre- breakfast visit to a beautiful white sandy beach, which is the nesting ground of Pacific green sea turtles. Pretty soon their eggs will start hatching. Unfortunately most of these newborns will be an easy meal for many natural predators such as frigatebirds, pelicans, herons, and sharks.
Floreana Island has a brackish lagoon as well, and this is the niche for many lagoon birds; one species that caught our guests’ attention was the flamingo. They were just a few feet away, feeding on something that our eyes can’t see without the help of a stereo microscope; they are not the only ones that use this technique for feeding – some other creatures do the same, such as blue whales and manta rays.
After this spectacular activity we headed to Champion Islet, which is a very small island off the coast of Floreana. This tiny place is perfect for snorkeling activities, and this morning it was at its best, as the water was very refreshing and crystal blue, making it possible to see many species of fish. We circumnavigated in our Zodiacs to search for the Floreana mockingbird and many marine birds that make this little island their home, and we even explored the entire coastline on board our glass bottom boat – this time with the help of one of our naturalists for fish identification. It was an amazing morning activity!
For the afternoon we continued our adventure in a different place known as Post Office Bay. This bay was visited by whalers back in the early 1800s, and one of them set a barrel to collect correspondence from their families in England; we disembarked with our guests to drop and collect post cards to be hand-delivered and hoping to make new friends. After this short visit we took our Zodiacs to explore this area, with spectacular success. We saw Pacific green sea turtles, black-tipped reef sharks, blue herons, boobies, pelicans, rays, and Galápagos penguins, making this adventure unforgettable.
