Galapagos islands – flamingo’s and swimming with a turtle and ray

Another day, another island, this time we are back to Snata Cruz where we began our journey but this time we were at Bachus beach. We watched as the crew unloaded the zodiac of our food supplies as well as a cross trainer (needed after the amount of food we are consuming). Off we went on the zodiac’s for a wet landing on the beach, we saw the fins of sharks, a mother and baby. We walked along the beach, seeing turtle nests, some so fresh that the eggs must have only been laid 2 hours ago, you could see their tracks as they pulled themselves up the beach.

We saw the marine iguana’s slide through the water, brown pelican, ghost crabs (that unfortunately eat turtle eggs) and the reason we came here…flamingo’s. We watched one fly over head with black under it’s wings and we watched them feeding from the pools. Flamingo’s intrigue me as they feed up side down and they legs really don’t look like they can support their weight. We watched as they did a kind of dance to bring up their food from the silt.

Then it was time to snorkel again, unfortunately visibility was bad so we just saw some tropical fish but the warmer water was appreciated. The same can’t be said for the afternoon snorkelling where hypothermia was possible and I had to warm up by laying in bed for quite a while after a hot shower.

After the lecture on the geology of Galapagos, we got to experience it first hand by visiting Barthholme island where we went on a zodiac ride to see the 2^nd smallest penguin, the Galapagos penguin. We saw brown pelican, lava gull, boobies and pinnacle point. After the ride we snorkelled of the water was absolutely freezing, who would have thought that the equator would be so cold but it was oh so worth it. As soon as I got in I followed a turtle for quite a way, then a ray. We swan over to Pinnacle point to see star fish, the chocolate chip star fish, lots of carol, rainbow fish, yellow tailed fish and bobbies darting into the water. Following the turtle has to be one of the highlights of the trip. While I was snorkelling, Ali was getting eaten alive by mosquito’s so back on the boat to warm up, dinner, then another early night.