Floreana Island
Just as the young English naturalist Charles Darwin did in 1835, we arrived at Floreana Island and landed at Post Office Bay – a place with a lot of human history. After a 30 yard walk from shore, we found a very old barrel that serves as a mailing system, the oldest one in the south Pacific.
To keep the tradition alive, we got all the mail that was inside the barrel, and started reading the addresses out loud. Some of our guests found mail addressed to areas near where they were going, and they took it, promising to hand deliver it!
Later in the morning, we took a Zodiac ride around an Islet called Champion. We spotted red-billed tropic birds, shearwaters, blue-footed boobies, Nazca boobies, a solitary Red-footed booby and the elusive Charles or Floreana mockingbird endemic to this site. Shortly afterwards most of us went deep-water snorkeling at Champion, where the water was very clear; we came across big schools of fish and sea lions.
In the afternoon, our Galápagos National Park visitor site was Punta Cormorant. Turquoise waters and clear skies were waiting for us. Most of our guests practiced kayaking along a beautiful sheltered bay where seabirds and sea turtles were seen.
Shortly afterwards, we enjoyed a beautiful brown-green inorganic sandy beach. After finishing the kayak and beach activities we organized groups to go on a nature walk to the other side of this visitor site that passed along a brackish water lagoon. One of the highlights this afternoon was the vegetation that is unique to this area, as well as a big coralline sandy beach located at the end of the trail. We observed many green Pacific sea turtle nests; we even witnessed frigate birds trapping little baby turtles from their nests. The latter bird species is perhaps the most important predator in the area.
We returned to the ship just in time to see the sunset. We certainly have a lot of experiences to share during this evening recap!
