Huge Last Day in the Galapagos: Hiking, Snorkel, and Kayaking on Floreana Island

 What a grand finale'. Today was a packed day here in the Galapagos, exploring the southern island of Floreana Bay.

This could have been a black and white photograph, if it wasn't for those bright blue feet!

Our first stop was the famous Post Office Bay. Here you can find the most unique postal service in the world. There is no workers, no stamps, not even a wall or ceiling, just an old barrel and a honor system that has been working for centuries. Old whalers and buccaneers discovered that letter's left in an old barrel here in the bay, would eventually be picked up by sailors returning to Europe and hand delivered once back on shore. Fast forward to today, and now folks on expeditions, like the one I am on, leave addressed post cards in hopes that a future cruiser will find it and hand deliver it to its final address. A bunch of us wrote post cards to leave behind, and even more people took postcards that were addressed to places near their homes. It is a very unique place, and definitely one worth visiting if you are near Floreana Island in the Galapagos.

We will see how long it takes for this postcard to be hand delivered across the continents!

The zodiacs were a great platform to explore the wildlife rich shorelines and for photography as well.

We also had time to go for a coastal cruise, where we had extreme closeups with blue-footed boobies, Galapagos sea lions, christmas iguanas, brown pelicans, and even a few turtles popping up around us. And after our walk to the post office barrel, a bunch of us dressed out for snorkeling and went for a snorkel off the beach. Last year the waves were crashing into this bay, and we were able to snorkel, so I was stoked to get it in this trip. I must have seen thirty turtles, feeding in the shallows on all the algae. There were lots of little wrasses and some larger parrotfish. One couple saw a bigger shark farther out, which I missed, but I did see three stingrays on my way back in.

I was just walked out of the water when our Expedition Leader, Cati, said,"Dai Mar, do you want to go kayaking?" I jumped at the opportunity, quickly undressed, and pretty soon found myself whisked away to where the kayaks were waiting for us. It was a beautiful bay, filled with islands, which were in turn filled with wildlife. But perhaps the best part of the snorkel was the curious and playful sea lions that stayed with us for about fifteen minutes. Everyone was ready for lunch when we got back, and I couldn't believe that I had already gotten in a skiff tour, hike, snorkel, and a kayak, all before lunch!

The second part of the day was adventurous as well. We started with a deep water snorkel around an off-shore island, called Champion. They described it as, 'not a snorkel for you if you like being able to see the bottome.' Well, it turns out that I love being in places where the land forms a wall, descending into the depth, where I can't see the bottom. That is when big charismatic megafauna might go swimming by. Unfortunately the conditions were very rough, just like my last trip. Although, I've got to hand it to David, just like last trip he took our boat to the true backside wall of Champion, even though the waves were a bit crazy back there.

The schools of fish where we jumped in were immense. I could dive down and be completely surrounded by fish. It felt like I was one of the school. Unfortunately, every time I surfaced, I saw our other folks getting thrashed around by the waves. So I spent most of my time lifeguarding, instead of filming, until we got way around the corner to calmer water. The only problem with the calmer water side of the island, is that there just isn't a lot to look at. One of these days I'll catch Champion on a flat calm day! We did get to see a marble stingray, which was our sixth ray species of the trip!

Flamingo looking for food in the surf. This was a very unusual sight, seeing one in the ocean instead of an inland lagoon.

After returning from our 'advanced' snorkel, we quickly got changed into hiking clothes. We had one last hike at Cormorant Point. Here, nature surprised us once again, by provided two flamingos on the beach. It looked like there were feeding in the surf zone, which I had never seen before. We did walk further inland to find sixteen more flamingos on a huge inner lagoon. Farther on we emerged onto a beautiful white sand beach, filled with sea turtle nest. We could see tracks from nesting sea turtles from the night before, leading into the dunes. Just offshore we saw multiple shadows in the clear, shallow water. It turned out to be lots of mating turtles, a few big rays, and even a couple of sharks. Too bad they don't allow snorkeling here!

We returned to La Pinta for one final delicious dinner, and a farewell toast from the captain and crew. Everyone felt like we ended on a high note, and that the entire trip was just fabulous. The location is a UNESCO World Heritage site for a reason, and should be high on wildlife enthusiasts' bucket list. We will see if I ever get the chance to visit these amazing islands again, but I feel quite lucky having been here twice now.

One more night on the beautiful La Pinta.

Blue footed booby in flight.

More flamingos! We saw another sixteen or so in the lagoon at Punta Cormorant on Floriana Island. In total we probably saw about 20% of the total flamingo population here in the Galapagos.

This pelican kept flipping something black into its throat. You can just see it in this picture, but not enough to tell what it was.

The very unique blue feet of the blue-footed booby.

This fun zodiac coastal exploration was the first of six activities for me today. Skiff tour, hike, snorkel, kayak, second snorkel, and second hike.

This blue-footed booby was posing for our zodiac cruise.

If you have been following along with my adventures this trip, you may notice how different this marine iguana looks. Here on Floreana Island, the marine iguanas are called "Christmas Iguanas", because of their unique coloration.

We don't have blue-footed boobies back in Hawaii, so I made sure to take a lot of photos of them today.

There were quite a few sea lions around the coastline in the morning, and this young one was just too cute not to take a photo of.

This pelican had just launched himself out of the water when I snapped this pic.

A rare photo of a flamingo on a beach with the surf rolling in behind it.

The shoreline of Floreana was covered in these wild looking cactus trees.

Our beach landing at Post Office Bay

The beautiful white sand beach at Punta Cormorante.

The inland lagoon at Cormorant Point. The flamingos where way in the background.

Sunset over the lagoon.

We were able to get pretty close to the wildlife, even on the zodiacs!

Living my best life on the beach at Cormorant Point, on Floreana Island. This is where the sharks were visible just offshore.

Our guide, Dries, tell us about this history of the barrel at Post Office Bay.

Dry, cracked earth near the lagoon at Punta Cormorante. A lone flamingo can be seen right in the middle.