Galápagos Islands, Equador 🇪🇨
I slept pretty well last night, despite a choppy navigation to the only island fully north of the Equator, Genovese. This morning is cloudy but looking out at the long cliffs of the island with the bare trees sat on top, makes it just more mysterious looking.
We take the dingy to the beach and follow a path through the nests of Nazca (masked) boobies and Frigate birds. The chicks of the boobies are particularly cute bundles of fluffiness. Wandering down past mangroves with even more boobie nests, there are rock pools left from high tide, teaming with fish and Sally Lightfoot red crabs. There are hundreds of tiny crabs diving into the sand along the way, together with almost camouflaged black crabs sat on the rocks. A night heron is sat looking craggy and miserable as we stroll past.
On our return to the beach we don snorkelling gear and wade out to sea. There are lots of colourful fish playing in the shallows and we follow the rocks around to discover more. As we swim across the small bay to the rocks on the other side a cry of sharks goes up. The group gathers closer to observe about four sharks sat calmly on the bottom with a few big rays quietly hovering around them. I spot a white tip shark dart behind us, apparently they are harmless but decide to swim back to shore just to be safe.
After another good lunch we speed to Prince Phillips’s Steps which take us up the cliffs to the top of the island, here we find more Boobie and Frigate nests. The Boobies have their beaks open and are pushing air into their throats to keep cool, it looks like they are about attack but in reality none of the wildlife has seemed bothered by us. We step out to a barren lava field that is covered in birds, Petrols and Boobies all swooping overhead. As we walk on we are fortunate to not only see a Galápagos Owl but to see it eat it’s prey before flying off.
Our final snorkel of the day was near the cliffs and Prince Phillip’s Steps, jumping in from the dingy rather than the beach. This water is cooler and darker but we still see lots of fish playing around the rocks, perhaps bigger varieties. It was really exciting to have a sea lion swim past me and then spotting his friends sitting on a low rock just enjoying a siesta.
On our return to to boat there is hot chocolate and queso balls with honey. We get to meet the crew this evening before we settle in for the night and they navigate us to our next island.
