Galapagos - Day 9: San Salvador & Bartholomew

Alas, what seemed like a long vacation is now coming to an end. Once again, I feel like I should retire as soon as possible so I don't have these "ugh, we have to go back to work" feelings. Today was a relatively low-key day, we are back on the San Salvador (also known as Santiago or James) Island, the adopted island of Lindblad Expeditions. If you recall from the earlier post, this is the island that used to be overrun by 60,000-80,000 goats but is now down to zero goats and the iguanas have returned. 

Breakfast was scheduled for 7am again, with the first excursion going out at 8. Today really wasn't about wildlife anymore (maybe they acknowledge that we've hit all the big ones now and would not be as adequately excited about what we would be seeing); instead it's about landscapes. Off to the zodiacs again!

Okay I guess we can fit in a penguin sighting too - can't have a completely animal-free day!

The morning hike was over a lava flow landscape from an eruption about 120 years ago. Most of the lava here is of the “pahoehoe” kind -- which is rounded corners rope-y lava, as opposed to the sharp edges brittle “aa” lava. 

Check out all of those different lava patterns!

It was kind of cool seeing how clean these cracks in the lava are from when they cooled down -- you can see exactly how one side fits perfectly into the other. 

The pictures really don't do it justice -- in a way, it reminded me of the death valley landscape, though obviously this was a lava field instead of sand dunes. 

Obligatory cheeky shot of me falling into the lava crack.

Yeye got into the spirit as well -- here's him being chased by the lava:

I actually was curious how fast this lava would have moved and our guide (Felipe) told us it was like a thick ketchup or spaghetti sauce - so we could in fact probably run away from it. Good to know! Quick note on Felipe -- his grandfather, Rolf Wittmer, was the first registered birth in the archipelago (born in a literal cave). 

The entire island was just very other-worldly. 

Some of the shots of where the lava flow stopped reminded me of the retreating glaciers we saw in Alaska, instead of slowly melting ice, we had slowly cooling lava "tongues" through the forests/valleys. 

After lunch, the boat repositioned to Bartolome, and there was another snorkeling opportunity from the beach there. I decided to pass in lieu of packing -- I think I made a wise choice as Yeye (who braved the waters once again) said that the water was only 62 degrees!! It was very clear so great visibility but man, I would NOT have lasted long in that temperature. I did venture out for the last sunset hike though -- there was a sea lion blocking the stairs at the landing again - he just wanted to make sure we could say every excursion had SOME wildlife. 

But biggest news is that Baba was finally feeling better enough to join us!

Baba may not have realized he signed up for the ONLY true "hike" of the entire trip. Normally all of the "long" hikes or "fitness" hikes are still pretty tame, but this time it was a very uphill climb to the island summer -- about 350 feet up.  

The landscape here was similar to what I've seen in moon shots. Because of the drought conditions, few plants survive here and as a result no animals come either. Here's one of maybe two or three cactus plants I saw during our entire excursion here.

I think this is one of the classic landscape shots of the Galapagos islands though. 

Proof that Baba made it to the top! Sadly now that Baba had largely recovered (it seemed to improve pretty rapidly after he took the antibiotics), Nainai was rapidly descending into her own sickness cycle, so she wasn't able to join us on the excursions today. 

That leaning cone looks odd right? Turns out it was formed by a target practice exercise by the US military. Apparently during WWII, Ecuador agreed to let the US establish a military site here and released some bombs/artillery on the uninhabited islands -- one bomb hit what used to be a mound and half of it broke off and fell into the ocean, this leaning tower is the half that was left standing. 

And with that last sunset, we headed back to the ship for the farewell bbq and final bits of packing. Tomorrow, we say goodbye to the Galapagos Islands and fly back to Quito!

Galapagos - Day 8: Genovesa and Darwin's Bay

We left the people and cars of the Galapagos behind on Santa Cruz to return to unspoiled nature again. Today's destination is Isla Genovesa, but the British call it Tower Island. No wet landing this morning, and the excursions don't start until the late late hour of 8am!

Unfortunately Baba was still feeling pretty bad (with a crazy bad sore throat - hurts to even drink water), so I went off on this one by myself. The zodiac landing took us to Prince Phillip's Steps. Normally at home I get about 20+ flights a day so I was very happy to finally get some stairs in!

Genovesa is THE island for bird watching. You literally walk right by the birds -- if you're not careful you might even step on one. They seem to have zero predators here, so it was common to see frigate birds, red-footed boobies, blue footed boobies, swallow-tailed gulls, storm petrels, and tropicbirds all hanging out on a single beach.  Check out how close we could get to these birds!

I got quite a biology lesson on birds here -- maybe you all know this, but turns out the boobies are born with no feathers, so they look almost like leathery little reptiles, then within a week, they develop a full body of fuzz -- like in the picture below, that pill of fuzz under the mama bird is actually a one-two week old baby!

Here's another photo of a "baby" that is likely getting to five weeks old - at that point, they have developed their adult feathers and have shed/plucked off all the fuzz. Though color wise they'll still be in juvenile phase -- for example their feet won't be as brilliantly colored yet -- that won't happen until they're fully grown and ready to mate themselves. 

This was a great time of year to visit because we are basically at the end of the dry season awaiting the beginning of the rainy season. So the birds who live off of the plants and insects generally timed their mating season to give birth now, as there soon will be an abundance of green (with the accompanying insects) to sustain new babies. The babies were so cute! They obviously can't fly yet, so I'm told they do this shaking thing with their necks to regulate some of their body heat.

However, it also gave us a first hand look at the natural selection process. Our guide explained that each boobie usually lays two eggs and then waits to see which one hatches first - or if they hatch at roughly the same times, which one is slightly bigger or healthier. They then just totally discard the second one -- if it's in egg form, they just stop incubating it. 

If it's in hatchling form, they might even kick it away out of the nest. It seems a little cold hearted, but the bird must have realized through their centuries of evolution that they aren't capable of providing enough safety and food to sustain two chicks. Here's a photo of the sad side of natural selection:

To the boobies' credit though, they are VERY attentive to the chicks that are selected. They stay by them almost constantly - helicopter parents for sure. 😆 

I think this the bird version of watching your infant try to walk. 

This was Yeye's dream of an island for bird photos. He mentioned several times how much he wished he had come out here to the Islands a few decades ago -- so much good material for biology classes! 

Nainai meanwhile has been going to every single photography session they've had on the ship - I think there have been at least 3 already -- soon she's going to be a master wildlife photographer. Look at the risks she's willing to take for the best shot!

We even managed two sightings of the short eared owl - allegedly quite a rarity. 

I really wanted to see the great frigate birds with their scarlet puffed out chests -- unfortunately we were told that will only happen during their mating season. Alas. Slightly dull orange-red will have to do. Here's a close up from Yeye's powerful zoom. 

By comparison, this is what I can manage without sacrificing sharpness from my Pixel:

Beyond the birds that were just sitting around, it was also impressive how close the flying birds would get to us. Allowed me to take some really nice wingspan shots.

Here's a video to help showcase how the skies were just filled with so many different birds:

After the morning hike, we did a super fast wardrobe change and then headed off for another round of snorkeling. We were snorkeling in Darwin's Bay today and the temperature here was a full 3-4 degrees warmer than the location yesterday. So even though Baba was out of the count, I found myself a new dive buddy and went underwater exploring again. Here's my dive buddy Emily placating my penchant for cheesy posed shots with the fur seal. 😆 

I didn't have much more success with the underwater pouch though -- here's my best stop of the shark. It was so much more impressive in person. 

I did better with the octopus...ok fine this is a stock photo. But someone else in our dive pod did report seeing one of these. I hung around for a minute or so but eventually gave up. 

My coolest spot of the snorkel trip was probably the eel. It was so much thicker/fatter than I was expecting! Alas, no photo proof. 

After a warm shower and some very tasty lunch (grilled whole chickens -- really yummy), we listened to a presentation about Charles Darwin (it was very well done...but the after lunch hour is hard for any educator -- I saw several people nodding off). 

Our last activity of the day was another nature walk on Darwin Bay beach. The beach landing was actually a little tense because the sunning sea lions had basically claimed the entire beach. We had to step carefully in-between them. 

This island is actually devoid of any land reptiles, which meant that the cactus plants here evolved to be not-prickly prickly pears. You could actually brush them back and forth and it felt like a rough brush. 

Here's a shot of our guide for today - Christian. Christian's father is actually a fisherman on Santa Cruz. The fishing licenses are passed down in families - they cannot be sold and can't even be given to cousins or nieces -- only direct sons and daughters of the fisherman. The idea is that eventually, they want there to be no more fisherman I guess?

This field was FULL of birds. I didn't even capture all of them. Christian (jokingly? Who knows?) said they were gathered for a group fishing lesson. 

He actually just picked up a feather from the ground and started waving it in the air and that apparently was like a traffic control signal for them to all immediately take flight!

This seriously could be a Disney movie...one single boobie was left. Perhaps because he was afraid of flying or didn't know how yet...? Eventually one or two birds came back to join him so he wasn't completely alone. 

More shots - a pair of juvenile boobies here. 

The less celebrated but still pretty cool full grown red-footed boobie:

Here's a good example of boobie parents raising their young -- they were picking up twigs and rocks and feeding it to the baby -- almost like when you give a baby a rattle so they can work on their fine motor skills! 

Shot of the yellow-crowned night heron. Our guide kept remarking that it was so odd these guys were out already because they're supposed to be nocturnal...maybe evolution working as we speak?

Fun game -- how many birds can you find in this mangrove tree? I found at least 3, maybe 4. 

Great nature walk again...ending with yet another obstacle course water entry sidestepping all the sea lions. I like this shot because if you look closely, every adult mama sea lion here has a baby sea lion next to her waiting patiently (or sometimes impatiently) to feed. 

And that is the end of yet another wildlife day here. Sadly Baba is still pretty sick feeling so he missed a very tasty duck breast entree at dinner too. Tomorrow is our last full day on the ship -- hoping for a sudden recovery! 

Galapagos - Day 7: Santa Cruz

Today we land at the second largest island in the archipelago (outside of Isabela, the seahorse shaped island), Santa Cruz.  This is where we originally landed by plane as well. It's the most built up island here so instead of zodiac adventures looking for wildlife, we are doing a visit to the Galapagos National Park service and tortoise breeding center. 

The drive over has a good view of the telescoping effect of the landscape (ie, watching as several elevation landscape zones are passed through in quick succession). It was kind of strange being in a bus though -- we've been at sea and on uninhabited islands for so long that the idea of roads and cars was a little foreign feeling!

Here are some shots from the bus of Puerto Ayora, the "big city" of the Galapagos! (Home to 18,000 inhabitants, so big is a little relative). 

We soon arrived at the Galapagos National Park. 

And shortly thereafter, hit the entrance to the Charles Darwin Research Center. Btw, mystery solved, the guides kept saying what I heard as "Charizard" center and I was confused if they named some center after the pokemon, who I think is a fire lizard -- in actuality, they were just saying Charles Darwin really fast and dropping the "win" syllable at the end.

Here's Yeye checking for the resemblance to Darwin -- not bad! 😆 

Once we got inside the research center, we broke off into small groups for the Turtle Path. Here's our guide Christian telling us about the Galapagos prickly pear cactus tree here. I thought it was pretty cool how the tree just curved there at the top and then started growing further upside down. 

The turtle path was shaded by trees growing and bending down on both sides. Not a ton to see, but very picturesque. 

Okay, I guess nothing to see except things we've seen many times now before. But I guess I'll throw in this Galapagos mockingbird. 

The path leads to the Fausto Llerena giant tortoise captive breeding center. But it was cool because there were lots of exhibits along the way talking about evolution, Darwin's personal history, etc. for some reason, I really liked this poster/comment:

If you can't quite read it, it says "if their favorite food is next to the nest, then why fly?" (Explaining why the Galapagos Cormorants evolved to become flightless). 

This breeding center was also the home of “Lonesome George”, the last of the Pinta Island tortoises. When he died, the species became officially extinct.  He normally can be viewed (as a taxidermist) but he was out for maintenance right now. Apparently some California scientists went to Pinta and took what they thought were the last three remaining Pinta tortoises...well....they missed George. So he basically was alone on the island for half a century -- this the nickname "Lonesome George."

Christian also talked us through the three or four tortoise species that are also in danger of becoming extinct -- but there were also some success stories. They were down to like 2 males and 10 females in one species but then located one that was living in the San Diego zoo -- once they brought him back here, he was extremely social -- I think Christian said that 50% of all the tortoises in this species now stem from the San Diego import. 

But onto the real stars: the tortoises! Here are some adult hood tortoises being bred here. Once they reach age 5, they are released back into the wild. I hear these guys can eat up to 80 pounds a day if they are super hungry!

Check out that super long neck. They evolved that way because the plants on their native island were not on the ground (like grass) but instead on shrubs and trees, so they needed longer limbs and necks to reach the food. 

And of course the baby tortoises! These ones are less than 1 year old. 

The juveniles seemed to be eating nonstop during our entire visit. Maybe not that unlike human juveniles...

I didn't quite get the full shot here, but basically the way that tortoises (who are actually quite territorial) fight is not by scratching or biting or otherwise getting physical, they just face each other and then lift up their legs and necks as far up as they can -- whoever is tallest wins and the other guy knows to back down. This was the aftermath of such a "fight" - the tortoise on the right lost and is backing away. 

After we finished touring the research center, we were allocated about 90 minutes before lunch to shop for local souvenirs. No pictures, but got some Christmas shopping out of the way! 

The food at lunch (Bahia Mar) was quite good -- but the real X-factor was the amazing view.

 

After lunch, we went back on our buses to travel up to Manzanillo, a local ranch known for producing coffee and moonshine.  They also happen to be on the migratory route of the giant tortoises of Santa Cruz. Indeed - there were SO many tortoises. They were everywhere -- and even though they don't move very fast, I still had to keep moving to avoid getting in their path!

And they were BIG. (Also can we notice how amazingly lush and green this part of the island is? No color filters used on any of these!)

Baba stayed home today because he seems to be coming down with the flu or a bad cold. So no one was there to prevent me from taking copious amounts of selfies. 

We also managed to watch a mating session - the male tortoise makes a very loud grunting noise when he's mating and Salvador knew that sound so we just followed the sound until we found the pair. This was definitely an animal encounter I won't soon forget!

After the ranch visit, we boarded the bus again. This time, our destination was the Los Gemelos volcanic sink holes. Los Gemelos is twins in Spanish -- as the two sink holes are very close to one another and very similar in size and appearance. 

We also got to get a close look at the Scalesia cloud forest.  These trees are also known as broccoli trees - or Darwin refered to them as giant dandelions. I think broccoli is a better description personally...

The more scientific description: Scalesia is a genus of the family Asteraceae (daisy family) that is endemic to the Galapagos and consists of 15 native shrubs and tree species with six subspecies, earning the genus the Darwin’s finch of the plant world due to its great ability of adaptive radiation. 

After that we boarded the buses again back to the dock to take the zodiac back to the ship. Sadly, Baba is not feeling better yet...hopefully by tomorrow morning though? If be had to miss one day, today was probably not a bad one to miss.