Floreana Island

We woke up at a different island than yesterday. It is nice we can navigate over night so we get to spend more time on the islands, walking and snorkeling. Our visitor sites today showed us the island of Floreana from many perspectives. We were able to do one of the nicest snorkeling activities of the week, along the coastal part of an Islet called Champion. The sunny morning gave us the best visibility to practice this sport. The water temperature was 82 Fahrenheit, bath tub temperatures for some of our guests that come from northern latitudes. Drifting with the current along the coast we came across white tips reef sharks, huge schools of yellow tails razor fish, king angel fish, streamer hog fish feeding on sea urchins, and lots of sea lions surrounding us looking at us as if we were a new type of fish in their habitat!

The day continued with opportunities for kayaking, some beach time, and a Zodiac ride to look for the elusive Floreana mockingbird which, by the way, was found. One of the sightings we had was actually a very good one. We saw for sure at least five percent of the total population.

Almost at the end of the day we all landed at Cormorant Point, situated on the northern side of Floreana; to explore this part, we crossed a little peninsula, walking along a big brackish water lagoon that had so many greater flamingos. Our guests took a lot of pictures and since the sun was almost setting there was a very good light. We walked to a white sandy coralline beach where there were a lot of nests from green pacific sea turtles; some of the sea turtles were floating very close to the shore as they were almost ready to come ashore for their egg laying.

The day was full of surprises. Apart from the natural history of Floreana, we also learned about the history of this place that used to be a popular area for whalers and pirates. Their main interest was to get provisions here. We visited the famous post office, which is just an old barrel standing on a post, that used to be one of the most important mailing systems in the South Pacific Ocean. We kept the tradition, getting some post cards that were mailed by other visitors, with the idea of hand delivering them when we get home!

We had a lot of fun at the enchanted islands.