Floreana is a very famous by its mysteries and legends; it is because many human stories happened here, since the era of the pirates, early buccaneers, settlers, and even when Ecuador claimed the archipelago in February 12 of 1832. Today is a big day that celebration, and by coincidence today is Darwin’s birthday, Charles Darwin was the most important and famous visitor that came to Galapagos 3 years later of the claiming, it is at 1835.
Early in the morning we disembarked, to visit Punta Cormorant; a great area at the north side of Floreana; the first highlight is the greenish color of the sand; this place is a big concentration of peridotite, a glass common in basaltic rocks. Secondly is the big brackish water lagoon with many flamingos, they are very pink in their colorations because of the very nutritious shrimp to eat to survive; suddenly we saw up in the air a flock of them flying at the blue sky.
At the beach, there is a very small cliff made of ashes and pebbles from volcanic material; on the top of it, we found many blue-footed boobies nesting and having their rituals to fall in love. It is a very interesting court-ship to watch, in which they show their feet each other and spread their wing off as part of the ceremony. Pelicans also were fishing around, while some frigates very high into the sky were waiting to steal any piece of food. The morning was very productive and then we went back on board to have breakfast. Later we went to explore Champion Islet, place and home of the last dozens of Floreana mocking birds that still surviving in this small landmass; from the main island of Floreana they extinguished many decades ago by the introduction of feral goats that nowadays are not there anymore. To see these creatures is a very hard task but this time we were lucky and we spotted two of them. After our zodiac ride we jumped to the warm turquoise water to snorkel with sharks, sea lions, moray eels, a hundreds of multicolored tropical fishes; the experience of swimming with sea lions is unique; they are so friendly and playful with our intrepid guests that are astonished of having this National Geographic moment at the ocean.
In the afternoon we moved to post office bay, not far away from the morning place; here we explore bays surrounded by mangroves and small islets; some of our guests went to kayak and other preferred paddleboards to enjoy the place. They encounter schools of golden and eagle rays, sharks, many green pacific marine turtles and some sea birds diving around. All of us disembarked at post Office beach and walked a bit in land to hear the great story of this bay, where in 1793, a sailor placed over there a wooden barrel as post office, being the first mailing system of south-America, and nowadays still working as a tradition with thousands of people visiting the Galapagos every year.
The system is to find a postcard near the place you live and take with you back home, once there you have to hand deliver the letter, a great way to make new friends around the world.
At the end of the day, we returned to the Endeavour; the light on the sky was magical, the memories were unforgettable. Galapagos is a place that amazed every day, a new surprise, a new experience, a new miracle of mother earth.
