Santa Cruz Island
Early this morning we arrived to Santa Cruz Island on the central realm of the archipelago. We began our journey visiting the very famous Charles Darwin Research Center. One of the most famous tortoises in the world lives here, Lonesome George, who is the last one of his kind. He came from Pinta Island and shares his pen with two females from Isabela Island. He was sunbathing this morning while the females were walking around near their feeding platform. Sometimes they looked at each other, other times they looked at us with what seemed to be great curiosity.
Another famous tortoise is one coming from Hood Island. He is better known as Diego, and may be called the opposite of George. Diego lives with five females, and large numbers of eggs come from this corral. So far, the population from Hood is thriving and – thanks to the great conservation efforts – is slowly recovering. We are confident that, in the future, a different population of giant tortoises will recover.
We also saw tortoises in the highlands of Santa Cruz in their natural habitat; the humid zone provides lots of food and water for this local population. Some juveniles and adults were actively feeding; others were eagerly drinking water from a small pool. All together we may have seen nearly twenty!
After a full day of exploration – where we went to the lowlands, highlands, lava tubes, and lush thick forests – we returned aboard and now we are on our way to Isabela Island.
