South Plazas and Santa Fe Islands
Today our day began on a small colorful islet located off the northeast corner of Santa Cruz Island. After having breakfast our first outing was a hike on South Plazas. On this islet we were able to find many interesting species from sea lions to land and marine iguanas. During our hike we learned about how marine and land iguanas have been sharing the same habitat on this tiny island. Due to this situation, there is a lot of interaction here, and we can find a hybrid iguana; a cross breeding between this two species. After spotting many seabirds flying along the southern cliff of the islet such as swallow tailed gulls, red billed tropic birds, shearwaters, frigate birds, pelicans and more we headed back to the National Geographic Islander in the midst of a steaming hot morning. As soon we arrived at the ship, everyone decided to jump in the clear water found around the anchorage – what a great idea!
In the afternoon we headed to Santa Fe Island to continue exploring. Once there, we split our guests into shallow and deep-water snorkelers. In the water we found an incredible diversity of marine organisms from colorful fishes, sea turtles, spotted eagle ray, sea lions and even a huge shark! All this underwater activity happened in 84F clear water.
Later in the afternoon we landed on Santa Fe Island for an interesting hike. Some of our guest opted for a long hike and the rest of went for a short hike along the coast of this island. It was amazing to find how the geography of the area had changed in the last few months. The sand of one of the beaches was removed by the wave action. At the end of our visit we enjoyed the overwhelming colors of the sunset on our way back to National Geograpic Islander.
