Floreana Island
Floreana Island was named after the first president of Ecuador, Juan José Flores. It was under his presidency that Ecuador claimed the archipelago in 1832. Before this event took place, though, the archipelago was nobody’s land. Pirates, privateers, and whalers came to take giant tortoises and fresh water or used it as just a perfect hiding place from Spanish authorities.
Sometime in the late 1700’s Captain James Colnett reported about a wooden barrel where anybody could leave or pick up letters to hand deliver back home. This ancient tradition has been by far one of the most successful ways to have communication with the outside world for locals as well as for sailors.
We continued with the tradition and left some postcards and letters to be hand delivered; we also followed with the tradition by picking up some mail to be hand delivered by our guests.
This morning we also went on a Zodiac ride along the coast of Champion islet; there we looked for an elusive small bird: it was the Floreana mockingbird. We found a few feeding on cactus and insects. After our Zodiac ride we returned to get our snorkeling gear and went snorkeling.
We had perfect conditions for snorkeling; the water was clear, and warm; Galápagos sea lions were playing with us for a long time, and fish were plentiful.
After we sailed a short distance we arrived to Punta Cormorant where we found flamingoes, sea lions and several frigate birds trying to find some newly hatched sea turtles. Normally turtles leave the nest at night, however sometimes they come out during the day time and get eaten by frigates.
Great day in Galápagos!
