We started the day with a dry landing at South Plaza. The prickly pear forest and the arid terrain here has evolved into the natural habitat of the endemic land iguanas. The colossal species is found on six different islands within the enchanted archipelago, including south plaza where they have become the top herbivore. This volcanic floor of south plaza was uplifted from the bottom of the ocean millions of years ago, and today serves as the habitat for yellow dragons, finches, cacti, colonies of sea lions and a large variety of vegetation, snakes, and endemic scorpions. This phenomenon allowed for the biological process of secondary succession to take place. The cliffs of these islands are bathed by the breaking waves and they hold several nesting grounds for the Galapagos shear waters and Swallow tailed gulls, which are seen flying in search of food.
After lunch we dropped anchor and got ready to explore the visitor site on Santa Fe Island. Some of our guests went snorkeling along the shallow waters off the coast of Santa Fe. During our snorkeling adventure we spotted many species of fish-diamond sting rays, yellow tailed razor surgeons, spotted eagle rays, approximately 20 white tip reef sharks. We also saw several Green pacific sea turtles resting on the bottom of the ocean, some of them at their cleaning stations. Snorkeling could not have been any better, what an extraordinary outing today! Along the hike, the highlights were spotting the Santa Fe land iguana, in fact we were lucky to spot around 5 of these rare species only found on this island. Some of the iguanas were very friendly and welcomed us into their habitat. The greenery of these islands was impressive compared to other lowlands on other islands we previously visited. The incense trees had awakened since last rainy season. We also spotted two endemic Galapagos snakes along the way and 4 of the endemic Santa Fe rice rat. A few baby leaves are a sign of the light mist which bathes this place with the precious and rare precipitation on the islands. Some cactus finches, mocking birds and many sea lions were part of the fauna of this destination.
