Celebrity Xpedition Galapagos and Machu Picchu trip - Floreana Island - Post Office Bay, Champion Island snorkeling, and Punta Cormorant - Floreana Island
It's another three-stop day for us. Busy, busy. I forgot to mention in yesterday's entry that toward the end of dinner, some guests heard strange things from down on Deck #3. The back of that deck is open and flat. That is where we board the Zodiacs. It turns out that it is also a lovely place for sea lions to rest. One was there as our Zodiac approached yesterday afternoon and apparently, more came back at night. Another one came up and I guess that was bad form as the first one was having none of it. There were a lot of strange noises and thrashing of necks and eventually, the second one slid back into the water, defeated. Dinner and a show. Wow!
I also want to address something that had been bothering me - the internet. The internet on this ship was poor at best. I couldn't get photos to load or videos to upload. It was frustrating trying to put together a blog post. But then, suddenly, two days ago, it started working great and continues to do so. Whatever they did, they fixed it and the Starlink internet has been great since.
This morning started early again as we boarded a Zodiac for an early morning cruise followed by a visit to Post Office Bay and a walk on the beach. Optionally, we could snorkel at the end, but we snorkeled this afternoon, so we conserved a little energy.
Before we took off, I had my first wildlife sighting of the day as this guy was hanging out on an outside door on Deck #5.
Arlona spotted frigates swooping by our room as well.
This morning was cooler - high 60s with a low overcast and humid. We headed out on Zodiac #3 to see the sights.
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| Leaving our home, the Celebrity Xpedition |
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| A bit of a gloomy start |
The first thing we encountered was some blue-footed boobys.
Many were preening, or so we thought. Vicky, our naturalist, explained that there is an oil duct near their tail feathers. They regularly express oil from that duct and spread it around, waterproofing their feathers.
We saw a tree hosting multiple frigates.
Of course, crabs were all over the place.
We saw several lava herons.
There were sea lions all over, as is the norm in the Galapagos. I've posted many photos already, so I didn't take any today. What was new, however, was sea turtles. We saw many of them. We were able to get a few photos and one short video.
We also caught a glimpse of the head of a Galapagos penguin, but it was from a distance.
We landed at Post Office Bay for a visit to the Post Office Barrel. What is a Post Office Barrel? Since sailors have been visiting this island, they established a location here where sailors could leave notes for home and other sailors would pick them up and deliver them. They keep the tradition alive today by having guests address postcards to themselves and leave them here. They encourage guests to look through the cards in the barrel, take any addressed close to home, and deliver them. What a fun way to meet people and share your travels! We grabbed two - one for near The Villages, and one in a town we will pass while driving to Michigan for Arlona's family reunion this summer. Fun!
With the overcast weather and our snorkel plans this afternoon, after walking the beach, we opted to return to Xpedition.
Lunch each day is themed. Sunday was Ecuadorian, Monday was international, today was Spanish, Wednesday will be Tex-Mex, Thursday will be off the ship at a ranch, and Friday will be Italian. They are feeding us well.
After a couple of hours of downtime (that let me get the morning's photos processed), we were off for a deep water snorkel at Isla Champion, a small island right next to Floreana Island. The term "deep water snorkel" just means that we will jump in off the Zodiac as the water is too deep to stand. It sounds a lot scarier than it is. There is a natural current that flows around the island and we were going to take advantage of it as we circled part of the way around the island clockwise.
As soon as we hopped in the water, it was insane. It was like we jumped into an overstocked aquarium.
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| There were fish everywhere! |
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| Our guide, Diego, was an excellent diver |
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| We're still trying to identify what this floating blob was |
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| Arlona snapped this guy and I grabbed some video |
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| Arlona saw this shark at the bottom - I missed it completely |
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| Arlona snapped this photo of me recording the fish - ha! |
There were so many fish!
Eventually, it was time to return to the ship for a well-deserved hot shower. About an hour later, we were off on a Zodiac again for another landing, this time, back on Floreana Island at Cormorant Point.
On the way, we were treated to a large group of dolphins doing their dolphin things.
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The landing was billed as an easy walk but it was anything but. It wasn't horrible, but there were steep parts of the trail and with my arthritic knee, I paid a little price. Along the walk, we took in some of the wildlife and views.
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| The landing beach had a bit of a green tint to it due to a mix of white sand and other organic material |
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| The ever-present crabs |
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| Lava lizards |
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| This spider appeared to be floating because its web was so thin - this was big, perhaps an inch across |
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| Endemic flowers - I didn't get the name |
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| Yellow warbler |
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| The beach on the opposite side of the island was more of a white sand |
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| We spotted some sea turtles from a distance - a head is up and the shadow to the lower right is a group of two to three more turtles - we spotted a shark too quite a way out |
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| A sea lion skull on a rock |
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| This is a brackish lake between the two beaches and home to more flamingos |
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| Don't worry, we'll get closer...much closer |
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| A pile of various skeletal remains that naturalists have found and set aside |
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| Arlona, the shell hunter, found some really cool shells |
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| Alas, it is forbidden to remove anything natural from the Galapagos so the photos will have to do |
We made our way to the pond where the local flamingos live. We also saw white-cheeked pintail ducks that also hang out there.
But...back to the flamingos. We saw some juveniles from a distance. They had not consumed enough food to turn their feathers pink yet.
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| There was a pink tint, but nothing like the adults |
The trail stopped right next to the pond. There were several flamingos there, less than ten feet away. They were feeding. They could not have cared less that we were there. They stirred the bottom to free up critters that live in the muck and then filtered it through their beaks with their head upside down. It was fascinating.
We were treated to a flight of two flamingos coming in to land.
It was awesome to catch flamingos on the wing and a nice cherry on top of another great day in the Galapagos.
We returned to the ship and relaxed for a few minutes before our briefing on tomorrow's activities and another lovely dinner.
Things don't start until 8:30 tomorrow morning so we get an extra half-hour of sleep tonight. Woo!
We will be in Yellowstone tomorrow. It’s really exciting as there are animals that can kill you. Wait until you get to Africa. The game drives are awesome.
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