Southern Isabela
I feel like eating a volcano today! It looks so amazingly gorgeous, that I can’t think about any other way to capture its wholeness. It’s perfect, it’s blue, it rises from sea level to 5,541 feet high and like a sacred peak watches omnipresent above this archipelago and its creatures. This is Cerro Azul, or blue mountain, one of the six volcanoes of Isabela Island, its southernmost shield. But today, that we can be so close and that the day is so perfectly clear, I have my doubts about its origins. We know these islands are the result of effusive eruptions and therefore their volcanoes have gentle slopes and end up looking like shields; however, today, this one resembles a conical shaped volcano. I know it’s impossible but in an archipelago of dreams, I can be allowed to make up a story. From the shoreline of Punta Moreno, Cerro Azul looks like a gigantic conical shaped volcano that has lost its summit; its slopes are steeper than the flanks of any of the other volcanoes of the area. Maybe it’s my perspective, maybe is the cool breeze that awakes my imagination, maybe it’s just because this is probably younger than the others, but today I want Cerro Azul to have a different origin.
I hadn’t been here for the last ten years, so my eyes enjoyed every angle and rock and sighting with the freshness of a first time. The Islander was the only boat anchored in the area, which added uniqueness and magic to the already amazing experience of having Cerro Azul so near and so beautiful. What else can I say? That there were penguins on fresh pahoe-hoe lava flows, and sea turtles in the water, mangroves painting the shoreline in green and flightless cormorants building awkward nests. Urbina bay this morning, an uplifted area, reminded us on how mobile and active our planet is. But it’s Cerro Azul, this afternoon’s mirage, what reigns in my mind; its wholeness, and blueness, that like a sacred peak watches, omnipresent, over this archipelago and its creatures.
I feel like eating a volcano today! It looks so amazingly gorgeous, that I can’t think about any other way to capture its wholeness. It’s perfect, it’s blue, it rises from sea level to 5,541 feet high and like a sacred peak watches omnipresent above this archipelago and its creatures. This is Cerro Azul, or blue mountain, one of the six volcanoes of Isabela Island, its southernmost shield. But today, that we can be so close and that the day is so perfectly clear, I have my doubts about its origins. We know these islands are the result of effusive eruptions and therefore their volcanoes have gentle slopes and end up looking like shields; however, today, this one resembles a conical shaped volcano. I know it’s impossible but in an archipelago of dreams, I can be allowed to make up a story. From the shoreline of Punta Moreno, Cerro Azul looks like a gigantic conical shaped volcano that has lost its summit; its slopes are steeper than the flanks of any of the other volcanoes of the area. Maybe it’s my perspective, maybe is the cool breeze that awakes my imagination, maybe it’s just because this is probably younger than the others, but today I want Cerro Azul to have a different origin.
I hadn’t been here for the last ten years, so my eyes enjoyed every angle and rock and sighting with the freshness of a first time. The Islander was the only boat anchored in the area, which added uniqueness and magic to the already amazing experience of having Cerro Azul so near and so beautiful. What else can I say? That there were penguins on fresh pahoe-hoe lava flows, and sea turtles in the water, mangroves painting the shoreline in green and flightless cormorants building awkward nests. Urbina bay this morning, an uplifted area, reminded us on how mobile and active our planet is. But it’s Cerro Azul, this afternoon’s mirage, what reigns in my mind; its wholeness, and blueness, that like a sacred peak watches, omnipresent, over this archipelago and its creatures.
