Isabela Island: Urbina Bay & Tagus Cove
Our journey in paradise continues, this time with a visit to Urbina Bay and Tagus Cove, both located on the western part of Isabela Island.
After breakfast we landed at Urbina Bay, a popular nesting ground for Pacific green sea turtles. Until recently, the early 1950s, Urbina Bay was totally submerged in the ocean. A tremendous volcanic activity of Alcedo volcano abruptly uplifted it. Hiking here we found a lot of evidence of this geological event – most evident are the great amount of giant pieces of white coral far away from the coast. The wildlife of the area was amazing; we counted seven giant tortoises and about nine land iguanas! Shortly after the hike everybody went for a swim at the beach, and while on the beach some of us saw baby sea turtles coming out of a nest and making their way to the sea – it was spectacular.
In the afternoon we visited Tagus Cove, a historical place once visited by whalers, pirates and buccaneers. Our guests were offered many options for their afternoon, the most popular were kayaking and the walk, and some of us managed to do it all – going on a Zodiac cruise and deep-water snorkeling, too. Among the species we saw were Galápagos penguins, flightless cormorants, blue-footed boobies, brown noddy terns, and sea lions.
