Last night we left Isabela Island and began our navigation towards Santiago Island, which is located in the central realm of Galapagos. Today we arrived to the western region of Santiago and explored Buccaneer’s Cove. This area has amazing scenery, with high cliffs and very large lava rocks that resemble elephants, or even a person standing.
We had many options for our guests, and started by kayaking along the coast. This allowed our guests to see get up close experiences with blue-footed boobies, Galapagos fur seals and also to marvel with the impressive landscape. The next group to depart were our guests that wanted to go on a ride on our glass-bottom boat, from this very comfortable boat we got a chance to see lots of fish of different kinds as well as marine invertebrates. The other option was to go snorkeling from the Zodiacs in deep waters; here we had the opportunity to enjoy the colorful marine life of the area.
This afternoon we went to Puerto Egas, which is an abandoned salt mine. Some people lived here in the sixties, and although they left a long time ago, one can still see some evidence of their time here. Some guests stayed on a black sandy beach and went snorkeling from there, others went on a walk along the coast where we found Galapagos sea lions, marine iguanas, Galapagos mockingbirds, and brown pelicans.
At the end of the afternoon, we returned to the National Geographic Endeavour II and enjoyed a delightful dinner.