Floreana Island
It has been another full and wet day in this enchanted Archipelago. The overall climate is best described as subtropical, but varies greatly from year to year, season to season, due to changes in the strength and limits of the current. There are two main seasons known as “warm wet” and “dry cool”. During this week we have had more than the annual precipitation of the whole year. Rainfall is extremely erratic. On the coast of the islands annual rainfall can be less than 1” or as much as 55”, in the interior the recorded extremes are 15” and 80”.
In the afternoon we landed on the green beach at Punta Cormorant, where there is a beautiful lagoon with pink flamingoes, and we saw various endemic plants of the arid vegetation zone. But we also saw Sally Lightfoot crabs all over the rocky shore lines. They are the most active crabs of the intertidal zone. There are over a hundred species of crabs in the Galapagos, but only one stands out from the rest. The Sally Lightfoot, Grapsus grapsus.
Today’s water temperature was 82º F.
It has been another full and wet day in this enchanted Archipelago. The overall climate is best described as subtropical, but varies greatly from year to year, season to season, due to changes in the strength and limits of the current. There are two main seasons known as “warm wet” and “dry cool”. During this week we have had more than the annual precipitation of the whole year. Rainfall is extremely erratic. On the coast of the islands annual rainfall can be less than 1” or as much as 55”, in the interior the recorded extremes are 15” and 80”.
In the afternoon we landed on the green beach at Punta Cormorant, where there is a beautiful lagoon with pink flamingoes, and we saw various endemic plants of the arid vegetation zone. But we also saw Sally Lightfoot crabs all over the rocky shore lines. They are the most active crabs of the intertidal zone. There are over a hundred species of crabs in the Galapagos, but only one stands out from the rest. The Sally Lightfoot, Grapsus grapsus.
Today’s water temperature was 82º F.
