Floreana Island
This island is located on the southwestern part of Española Island and to the south of Santa Cruz Island. Our guests woke up very early today to pay a visit to Post Office Bay. We landed on a greenish sand beach and after walking just few yards the guests found a surprise! They saw a wooden barrel with a little door. Once they looked inside, they realized that it was a Post Office barrel.
With curiosity, we started reading the addresses with the hopes of finding one near our homes so we could continue the tradition and deliver the postcard or the message hand to hand without using stamps. A couple of guests were amazed to find postcards that were, in fact, not only addressed to their city but to their own neighborhood!
The Post Office barrel is not only one of the most historical places in the Galápagos, but it is an amusing one as well. As soon as we came back onboard we immediately headed with the National Geographic Polaris to another destination, Champion Islet.
Snorkeling in this area is spectacular, and today was no exception. Even though the current was very strong, we observed several Galápagos sea lions that were playing around with us. Next activity was a Zodiac ride looking for the rare Floreana mockingbird. We were lucky, for we spotted seven of them. Some mockingbirds were seen flying from cactus to cactus and one of them was seen eating the yellow cacti flowers. The scene was truly beautiful, for a couple of Galápagos sea lions were sleeping just underneath the cactus right next to a Swallow tail gull.
After lunch the ship was repositioned once again, this time to Punta Cormorant. This place is remarkably very different from the previous locations; it was hard believe that we were on the same island. We had great kayaking. It was windy and with strong current; the latter weather conditions made the experience a thrilling one.
Later on in the afternoon, we disembarked on a beautiful olivine beach, walked a few more yards and found a brackish lagoon where we observed Greater flamingoes. We spotted a couple of colorful adults with four juvenile flamingoes. We kept walking to a second beach, a coralline one, where we found sea turtles nests. We observed a few sea turtles mating far off shore as well. A curious frigate bird was wandering and hovering around looking for turtle hatchlings around the nests.
We made our way back to the ship. An extraordinary sunset was a golden finale for this beautiful day in paradise.
This island is located on the southwestern part of Española Island and to the south of Santa Cruz Island. Our guests woke up very early today to pay a visit to Post Office Bay. We landed on a greenish sand beach and after walking just few yards the guests found a surprise! They saw a wooden barrel with a little door. Once they looked inside, they realized that it was a Post Office barrel.
With curiosity, we started reading the addresses with the hopes of finding one near our homes so we could continue the tradition and deliver the postcard or the message hand to hand without using stamps. A couple of guests were amazed to find postcards that were, in fact, not only addressed to their city but to their own neighborhood!
The Post Office barrel is not only one of the most historical places in the Galápagos, but it is an amusing one as well. As soon as we came back onboard we immediately headed with the National Geographic Polaris to another destination, Champion Islet.
Snorkeling in this area is spectacular, and today was no exception. Even though the current was very strong, we observed several Galápagos sea lions that were playing around with us. Next activity was a Zodiac ride looking for the rare Floreana mockingbird. We were lucky, for we spotted seven of them. Some mockingbirds were seen flying from cactus to cactus and one of them was seen eating the yellow cacti flowers. The scene was truly beautiful, for a couple of Galápagos sea lions were sleeping just underneath the cactus right next to a Swallow tail gull.
After lunch the ship was repositioned once again, this time to Punta Cormorant. This place is remarkably very different from the previous locations; it was hard believe that we were on the same island. We had great kayaking. It was windy and with strong current; the latter weather conditions made the experience a thrilling one.
Later on in the afternoon, we disembarked on a beautiful olivine beach, walked a few more yards and found a brackish lagoon where we observed Greater flamingoes. We spotted a couple of colorful adults with four juvenile flamingoes. We kept walking to a second beach, a coralline one, where we found sea turtles nests. We observed a few sea turtles mating far off shore as well. A curious frigate bird was wandering and hovering around looking for turtle hatchlings around the nests.
We made our way back to the ship. An extraordinary sunset was a golden finale for this beautiful day in paradise.
