Tonight we have an 8 hours sail to Genovesa Island in the north. It was sort of like trying to sleep in a washing machine.
The first walk of the day we went along the cliffs to see masses of Blue Footed, Red Footed, and Nazca Boobies, and Gulls and their babies.
This is the Darwin finch that started it all. Darwin came to the Galapagos for 9 weeks when he was 23 years old. He noted the distinct differences between the same species on the different islands. Twenty five years later he published his origin of the species.
The snorkel today was in poor visibility conditions, but there was still tons to see.
In the afternoon we headed higher up the island onto the Cliffside.
The birds are completely unafraid of you and they are everywhere.
We spotted an owl and saw a Boobie feeding and defending her chick from a frigate bird.
Tonight we had a 7 hours sail south to Bartolome Island. I guess we should have been a bit more worried when they handed out anti seasickness pills at dinner and we started sailing as soon as dinner was over. It was an incredibly rough first hour, but the second was better and we did finally sleep.
This landing was on a volcanic landscape where you walk up to the mirador to view the lava field and the most popular view in the islands.
Today’s snorkel was epic with tons of fish, penguins, sea lions, turtles, rays, sharks, shellfish, and even an octopus.
The highlight of the trip was swimming with the penguins. They come right up to you. One even wacked Dan in the camera on video.
The afternoon walk was on the lava formations followed by a dinghy ride to see more penguins.
