Day three in the Galapagos saw more snorkeling, an excursion to see the marine iguanas, and a Zodiac trip along the cliffs in the rain(amung other things). It also saw my first “Galapagos Moment” which Angela/I have defined as moments where you see something truely amazing that feels unique to the Galapagos. Each day, we were provided with a sheet that showed the schedule for the day along with details about what we needed to bring. As I learned in the army, 90% of success is being in the right place at the right time with the right uniform. :)
The day started with an excursion to Punta Espinoza on Isla Fernandina. The ship covered a lot of ground overnight, crossing the equator and bringing us to the western side of the Galapagos. The climate felt different over here (although that may just be that it rained today) and felt a lot more tropical rather than desert. This excursion involved a very tricy entrance to a mangrove forest - the zodiac drivers were very impressive in getting in and out of the inlet, especially as the tide went out right before our pickup. The “dock” was built 50 years ago and the naturalist claim that the island rising has caused it to become harder to reach - which I believed only after seeing the instantaneous land rize later in the trip, but I digress. The dock was really just some concrete steps, but they served their purpose.
The primary wildlife to be viewed on this excursion was the marine iguanas, which had basically taken over this part of the island. They were everywhere… and basically stacked on top of each other. It was still morning and the iguanas need to reach an internal body temp of 96 deg F before they go swimming, so most of them were out sunning themselves. Marine iguanas “sneeze” constantly, which is basically excreting salt (with a bit of water) from a special gland under their mouth to keep the salinity of their body low enough.
They also deficate/urinate all over the rocks they are warming on and with the quantity of iguanas there, there was a significant pool (and smell) forming near them. This apparently makes for a great feeding ground for lava lizards who eat the flies that it attracts. The best place to find the flies is from a vantage point directly on the iguanas head - which almost looks like the iguana has a hairdoo.
Where there are iguanas, there are lava lizards (and also where their aren’t iguanas). We saw a lot of these little guys all over the islands and apparently each island has a unique subspecies that are slightly different than other islands.
We also saw a couple of Galapagos hawks, which are apparely only on a few islands. They prey on a number of marine and terestrial animals and apparently scare off the red footed boobies (which is why the red footed boobies are only on a few islands as well). It is on the larger side for hawks that I am familiar with but has that very streamlined hawk look.
Lots of Sally Lightfoots here as well. Some of them in better light that before, so more pictures were taken. One thing we learned on this outing is that these crabs can regrow legs and regularly shed them when a preditor attacks them. I counted legs on crabs after this and it was rare that I was able to find a crab with all 8 legs (and 2 pincers). No wonder they are so skidish around other animals!
Sara had the opporunity to learn about crabs molding their shells first hand. There were these crab “shells” that crabs had shed all over the island if you looked closely. Like a lot of crustaceans, these crabs need to molt and shed their shells as they grow so that they can build a new bigger shell.
The infamous Darwin’s finches… These little guys were fast, I got better pictures later on but I got a couple this time when they were just taking off.
One new plant we saw on this excursion was the lava cactus. This is a starter species and they are the first to appear on lava flows, growing out of the cracks. As they grow/die, they leave behind organic material that other plants use to get a foot hold in a new area. There were some huge patches of them on very stark lava flows, so they must be doing something right.
It was a hot one again, but thankfully for Sara & the kiddos there were planty of places to cool off. It became a game very quickly, running from one tidal pool to the next…
Another bird we saw for the first time on this excursion was the flightless courmorant. As the name suggests, these birds have lost their ability to fly but have become amazing swimmers and spend most of their time (and get basically all of there food) from the ocean. They are large/heavy birds with oversized feet/tails which they use for swimming. I had the opporunity to watch them dive later in the day and it was quite the spectacle.
Some other animals we saw on this excursion - pelicans, sea turtles, and sea lions. The sea turtle came right up to the beach to get a look at us and the sea lion seemed to be a juvenille and was barking to try to attrach a parent to come back (probably to feed it).
We also ran into an oyster catcher protecting it’s eggs. These are common in the PNW, but I’ve not seen a nest before. Apparently they always nest on the beach, just above the high tide mark. One parent always remains with the eggs and guards them agressively from other animals.
We also saw the bones of what was once a right whale. Apparently the park rangers happend upon the carcass 5-10 years ago and pulled it ashore. The bones are still there - I’m assuming manually situated to show the size of the animal. Most of the bones had disapeared at this point, but most of the spine was fully intact.
After getting back to the boat, we got ready for snorkeling near Punte Vicente Roca. We disembarked direcly from the zodiacs this time and this was a truely spectacular snorkel. It also marked my first “Galapagos moment” where I was watching a flightless courmorant dive and I spotted a sea turtle. While watching the sea turtle…
I decided to give chase to the sea lion and I was doing ok as he was coasting, but as soon as he flicked those flippers, it was all over… Still it was an amazing momment and I was glad that I was able to capture it on video.
I was experimenting with taking photos on the gopro and I was starting to get pretty good at it. The fisheye lens makes it a bit harder to frame your photos, but it does a great job of caputuring the feeling of an area surrounding your subject. In this case, my subjects included fish of various kinds, an eagle ray, and a very interesting sea star.
We spotted the Eagle ray early in the snorkel. I got a couple of pictures of it feeding in the slideshow above, but I was also able to watch if swim away. This video was a very interesting contrast to the Manta rays we saw later in the trip - they way the different species of rays swim is something I hadn’t though of before, but the technique is very different. This eagle ray used most of it’s body to propel itself while the Manta ray is able to control it’s wings to the extent that it can make tiny flicks of just the very ends of it’s wings.
One of the highlights of the snorkel was the iguanas - who were now warm enough to start feeding. They very much look like little dinosaurs - especially when they use their claws to cling to the rocks while they are trying to get leverage on the algae that they are eating off the rocks. There were a lot of them in the water, but they were very spread out in the water (unlike on land) so they seemed like much more solitary animals.
I was also able to capture one swimming on the surface. The way they swim is not terribly graceful, but their large tail is able to deliver a lot of force and can propel them quite quickly when needed.
Last video of the snorkeling trip - I thought the seaweed getting blown back and forth in the waves was very tranquil…
After returning from our snorkeling trip, we had lunch before embarking on a Zodiac ride along the cliffs of Isabella Island (Banks Bay) where we saw a number of birds, furr seals, and impressive cliffs/geology. It was a rainly Zodiac ride and it made for some unique viewing of animals in more ostere conditions.
We also got to see the infamous Galapagos Fur Seal. These poorly named sea lions drifted in from the antartic at some point in the distant past and have lowly evolved into a separate species. They are poorly adapted for the heat, so they spend most off their time in the water and primarily in the shade of large boulders/etc. They are also nocternal feeders - so most of their daytime activies are simply staying cool.
We also discovered our second booby of the trip - the nazca booby. This little guy was believed to be a sub-species of the masked booby which has a similiar appearance and lives elsewhere in the world. Apparently they were recently determined to be a separate species (not sure who decides this…). This one looked particularly miserable in the rain, but I suspect that’s more to do with it being harder to spot food in the ocean when there’s less light?
Last but not least was our first sighting of a Galapagos penguin - of which there are like 2k in the wild today. These little guys are super fast, something like 35 mph when they want to - but even their relaxed speed was easily 10 mph. You had to have your camera ready to get a good picure of one of these… Mine is ok.
After returning to the main ship, we headed back up to the equator to do the equator crossing ceremony (our crossings last night were deferred because we were asleep). We had a little shindig with some wine and limbo. The naturalists had constumes as well - just for funzies. Angela spilled some wine on me with the boat rocking as it were - so I made for quiet the picture in this one.
Then off to dinner and bed - exhausted!