Today we started our day with a pre-breakfast walk to Punta Cormorant on Floreana Island. Here we observed some land birds such as white-cheeked pintail ducks and a couple of greater flamingoes, one of which has been incubating an egg for the last three weeks right on the shore of the lagoon. Today we had a gorgeous clear morning with no wind, so we had a chance to observe the mirror-like reflection of the vegetation and the surrounding volcanoes on the brackish water lagoon.
After walking we returned aboard to have breakfast, and then we went on a Zodiac ride along the coast of Champion Islet to look for the very elusive Floreana mockingbird. This bird inhabits this islet and is locally extinct on the big island of Floreana. Some of our guests were very lucky, and saw a few mockingbirds flying around the dry vegetation looking for insects.
As we returned aboard, we got into our snorkeling gear and headed to the islet once more. This time we went snorkeling from our Zodiacs into the deep waters. This islet has a lot of marine life to observe, and this morning we swam with sea lions, several species of fish, and marine invertebrates. Some of our guests also had the option of a ride on our glass-bottom boat and enjoyed watching the marine life that this area has to offer.
After all these activities, we headed towards Post Office Bay, a historical area where whalers used to leave their letters inside a wooden barrel. These letters were picked up by other sailors, and hand delivered at different ports in Europe and North America. We followed the tradition of the whalers, and looked into an old wooden barrel for letters and postcards to be hand delivered in a nearby future.
At the end of the day we left Floreana Island behind with its many volcanoes and wonderful volcanic landscape as we started to navigate to Santa Cruz Island late in the evening.
