January 30, Monday – Galapagos, Ecuador - Espanola

Our first island on the cruise is Espanola, a small uninhabited island with lots to offer.  In the morning we were fitted with snorkeling gear and headed off for a morning of snorkeling.  Paul opted for the deep water site and Mary headed to the beach.

Mary tried out her new GoPro for underwater photography but with the sandy beach the water was a bit cloudy so she was only marginally effective in getting pictures in the water. 

There were a number of sea lions on the beach so after snorkeling for a while she took some pictures of the sea lions sun bathing.  The new GoPro did a pretty good job out of the water.

Paul had a disposable camera for underwater photos.  

Among other things his group saw a huge school (?), flock (?), swarm (?) of golden rays. Pretty awesome. 

And one of their really big highlights was traveling through a mass of dolphins.

While we had lunch the boat re-positioned to another area of Espanola.  In the afternoon Paul opted to stay on the boat as he is still not feeling well while Mary joined the hike on the island.  The “trail” was really a path over fairly large rocks.  Footing was unsteady and it was rather hot and humid but the pace was slow so she managed fine.

The Galapagos is all about unique animal and bird species located nowhere else in the worlds so we’ll just list the species she saw on the hike:

Sea Lions

Marine iguanas

Sally Lightfoot Crabs

Lava Lizards

Espanola Mockingbird (different from the Galapagos Mockingbird)

Galapagos Hawk

Galapagos Dove

Galapagos Small Ground finch

Warbler Finch

Swallowtailed Gull

Magnificent Frigatebird

and Nazca Boobies.

In the distance we saw flocks of Galapagos Shearwater’s wheeling around the cliffs

There was also a blowhole right in the middle of one of the Nazca Boobie nesting areas.

Great first day of wildlife watching.

A Nazca Boobie and a Sea Lion