Isabela Island
Today we got to start our new year with the right combination of activities and in one of the most beautiful places in Galapagos. Our adventure started this morning on Urbina Bay, located on Isabela Island. Urbina Bay beach serves as a nesting site for green pacific sea turtles and is a great place to spot our world famous land iguanas and Galapagos giant tortoises.
Isabela is one of the youngest islands and also one of the most biologically diverse of them all. As soon as we landed on Urbina Bay today the first two Zodiacs got to see two female sea turtles leaving the beach and getting into the water. We could not get off the Zodiacs fast enough to photograph these amazing creatures. All of our guests became captivated by this event, one that does not occur every day.
After strolling past the beach and into the heart of Urbina Bay, we quickly started observing land iguanas – unique to this area of the Galapagos – Darwin’s finches, lava lizards, yellow warblers, Galapagos hawks and also two small giant tortoises endemic to this specific island. After the walk, our guests had the opportunity to swim and snorkel from the beach.
In the afternoon we visited one of the places frequented by sailors: Tagus Cove also located on Isabela Island. On Tagus we had all sorts of options, some went kayaking, some snorkeling and some went on a Zodiac ride to look for penguins, flightless cormorants, sea turtles and any other critter that would want to make an appearance.
After the water activities we took our guests ashore to begin a walk which would lead us to the famous Darwin’s lake and also to an eroded cinder cone from where we were able to see breathtaking landscapes and some young lava flows from nearby volcanoes. Certainly a great start to this year and a stunning closure for this day.
