Santiago Island
After navigating the whole night we began the day off with an early walk on Espumilla Beach. This paradisiacal location has many attractions: a wonderful long sea turtle nesting beach, a mangrove forest, a shallow lagoon and a fabulous view from up the little hill that crowns the trail filled with huge mature “Palo santo” trees — and all in the company of a marvellous choir of Darwin finches.
During breakfast, our Captain repositioned National Geographic Islander to Buccaneer Cove. This place was once a favorite location of pirates and privateers where they could find calm anchorages and provisions in the form of freshwater, firewood, and plenty of tortoise meat. All these years of merciless exploitation are gone; nowadays Santiago Island is under the protection of the Galápagos National Park Service in order to preserve its ecosystems. For Lindblad Expeditions, Santiago Island is a very special, for it was adopted by the company several years ago. By providing funds to the Galápagos National Park Service, we’ve helped the eradication of feral pigs and goats on the island.
Snorkeling in Buccaneer Cove was excellent. Today we saw many colorful tropical fish, reef sharks, several rays and some Galápagos sea lions. After this successful outing we had a couple of options to choose from: kayaking or a Zodiac ride. The riders and kayakers explored the rocky coast and had a blast under the impressive tuff cliffs and into the shallow caves of the area. Blue-footed boobies, Brown pelicans and Noddy terns were seen everywhere. We were all back by noon after spending a busy but great morning!
After lunch I had the joy of giving one of my favorite presentations: “Charles Darwin, a Retrospective of His Extraordinary Life.” Immediately after I finished at around 3:30pm we disembarked, with the aid of our Zodiac fleet, at Puerto Egas. We had a couple of options: a long walk along the coastline or spending the whole afternoon swimming, snorkeling and/or relaxing at the black beach.
The walk follows an extraordinary path nearby the ocean that is full of lava shores. Shore birds and Galápagos fur seals were highlights among the amazing amount and diversity of wildlife to see. Vibrant colored Sally Lightfoot crabs against the black lava, Lava herons chasing them, invertebrates in the tidal pools, an elegant-looking Yellow-crowned Night heron, American oystercatchers, Brown pelicans and Galápagos sea lions here and there. The afternoon’s light was extraordinary for photography. This magical warm light dramatically enhanced textures and colors. As the day was coming to an end we returned to the ship with the company of the last sunrays of the day. Our hearts and minds are so full that I cannot avoid but feeling a beautiful mix of joy and inspiration provoked by the magic of this remote archipelago. Life is good!
