Santa Cruz – Tortoises and Tortuga Bay

Posted on January 8, 2021 by Lark

Last time, we did some adventuring around Santa Cruz Island. We visited some spots downtown and checked out Las Grietas (aka the best snorkeling spot), Los Gemelos lava craters, and the lava tubes of El Chato Tortoise Reserve.

There are a few tortoise reserves on Santa Cruz, and I told our taxi driver, Fredy, to take his pick and that we’d be happy as long as there were lava tubes and tortoises. So, we ended up at El Chato. These reserves are different from the conservation centers because they’re privately owned, and the tortoises are technically wild! They’re there because it’s a good habitat, not because they can’t leave. It was weird to see them in the “wild”… we even saw a tortoise crossing the main road! (That sounds like the beginning of a bad joke.) It was a strange sight after only seeing them in captivity to that point. At least with tortoises, unlike with deer, you don’t have to worry about them speedily darting out in front of your car!

Anyway, El Chato used to be a cattle ranch, but around 20 years ago, the owners started working to return the land from farmland to a natural habitat for tortoises, changing the farmland vegetation to native vegetation. This transition naturally brought tortoises back to the land. Now, it’s a lush, green forest and is really beautiful! Besides the vegetation, there are also a bunch of muddy pools that tortoises love. They sometimes spend multiple days hanging out in them, likely to help regulate their body temperatures and maybe to also kill ticks and protect from mosquitos.

I’ve talked a little bit about tortoises in previous posts, but later in our trip, my aunt and I visited the Charles Darwin Research Center, also on Santa Cruz, and learned a lot about the Galapagos tortoises in general. There were originally fifteen distinct Galapagos tortoise species from ten different islands. Now, unfortunately, only eleven species remain, due mostly to human interference and the thousands and thousands of tortoises that were killed for food and oil back in the whaling days.

This map shows where each of the 15 species originated and differentiates between the ones that still exist (blue) and those that are extinct (pink).

The Darwin Center is a research hub that monitors the wildlife of the islands and works to minimize damage and neutralize threats. The Center is involved with all sorts of conservation projects, and as part of their tortoise research, they’ve identified genes from two of the extinct species, the Pinta and Floreana, in some living tortoises! The hope is that it may be possible to essentially recreate those species through careful breeding. It sounds insane but also kind of amazing!

At the Darwin Center. I’ll never get tired of looking at baby tortoises (note the folded up screen that they use to protect them at night)

It’s just crazy to me that these tiny little things turn into those giant tortoises

This is taxidermized Lonesome George. He was the last Pinta tortoise, found there in 1971. There was a global search for a female Pinta tortoise, but it was unsuccessful, and George died in 2012. He’s now creepily memorialized at the Darwin Center.

The tortoise species fit into two major categories: dome-shell tortoises, and saddleback tortoises. The Santa Cruz tortoises have dome shells. These are typical of tortoises that live in wet zones and where food is plentiful close to the ground. As you’ve seen from the pictures, that’s definitely true of the Santa Cruz highlands! In drier places with less vegetation, the tortoises had to adapt to survive. Saddleback tortoises have shells that allow a wider range of vertical motion which allows them to reach food higher off the ground. It’s so cool to see such a clear example of how different habitats impact how species develop!

This is a good comparison image, showing the difference between the dome shells and saddleback shells.

These are the most dramatic dome shells… It looks like a mushroom was plopped on top of this tortoise. Like it actually almost looks like the tortoise and the shell aren’t really connected.

I don’t know what kinds of tortoises any of these are, but just observe the similarities and differences in their shells. This one has a very dramatic saddleback shape.

You can see that this is clearly a saddleback shell as well, but it’s not quite as dramatic as the last one.

These are definitely from a wet island because those shells are like pancakes.

I was surprised to learn that most Santa Cruz tortoises are migratory. It seems crazy for that to be the case for such a slow-moving animal! They move anywhere from about 65-2,300 ft (20-700 m) each day, and they travel up to 6mi (10km) from the coastal areas to the highlands during the rainy season. Tracking has shown that while most migrate (and move back and forth between two general areas), some of them seem almost nomadic, wandering here and there without any clear rhyme or reason. One aspect of the tortoise conservation work in Santa Cruz has been educating the locals about these migrations and asking farmers to use raised barbed wire fences so that tortoises can freely move about.

In case you’re wondering how quickly that distance is covered…

The answer is, “Not very.”

As you can see, plenty of green things to eat close to the ground

Fredy (our taxi driver) said that the tortoises have the feet of an elephant, the neck of a giraffe, and the face of a serpent. He’s not wrong.

Is it just me or does it look like this tortoise is glaring at us?

This balance between allowing people to live their lives vs. conserving wildlife is complicated. Some people think no humans should live in the Galapagos or even visit. Others think that people should be able to do whatever they want. Neither of these extremes is likely, so the question then becomes, “How can we best serve both interests?” It’s like a case study in compromise, and I think it’s something we can all probably learn from. Don’t get me wrong, the situation is far from resolved. But people are paying attention and trying to figure it out, and I think that’s worth something!

I think this little buddy is a Galapagos flycatcher

The tortoise reserve was our last stop for the day, so we headed back into town when we were finished. Everyone was pretty exhausted!

We had dinner at one of the little restaurants along this road. It closes to traffic at night so that they can put tables and chairs out in the street!

The next day, we had time for one more adventure before we had to catch our ferry to Isabela Island. We decided to check out Tortuga Bay, aka the MOST BEAUTIFUL BEACH IN THE WORLD. Yes, another one of those. Like I’ve said, I’m not a great judge of beaches, but this one was definitely memorable.

We walked from our hotel all the way to the beach, first walking about seven blocks to the start of the trail, and then walking another half hour/45 minutes on a shade-less trail to get to the bay.

The scenery along the way isn’t especially exciting, but I was fascinated by these cactuses with trunks that look like cartoon tree trunks. They’re in the opuntia cactus family, or “prickly pear”, and while many varieties exist, the Galapagos opuntias are endemic (they only exist there) and are the only ones that grow like trees! The tallest opuntia are found on Santa Cruz where they can grow up to 40ft (12m) tall! That’s crazy, in case you didn’t know.

Opuntia cactus trunk! Does this not look like a cartoon drawing of a tree trunk? It doesn’t look real. And it feels kind of plasticky and fake as well. But it’s not!

The opuntia cacti are well-suited to survival in the Galapagos. They can store large amounts of water, making them resilient in long dry periods. They can grow directly on rocks, an essential ability when the island is nothing more than a giant lava rock. Finally, they’re able to self-pollinate, so they don’t need other cacti nearby to reproduce. It’s not hard to see why that might be useful in a situation where you’re a wayward seed trying to populate a barren island! These cacti are a critical part of the Galapagos ecosystem. Iguanas and tortoises eat their pads, fruit, and seeds. Cactus finches eat their flowers, fruit, and seeds, extract water from their pads, use them for protection when building nests, and distribute their seeds across the islands (thanks to their poop!).

Try to tell me that these look real. (I won’t believe you.)

When we finally reached Tortuga Bay, we found ourselves at Playa Brava, the longest and flattest beach I’ve ever seen. With its white sand stretching out as far as the eye can see, it felt almost otherworldly. Most beautiful beach in the world? You can decide.

I like how they can curl themselves up like this.

Outcropping separating Playa Brava from Playa Mansa

We walked the endless beach until we reached another, Playa Mansa, where you’re allowed to swim. (You can’t swim at Playa Brava because the tides are too dangerous.) It’s supposed to be a great snorkeling spot because of the nearby mangroves, full of sharks and sea turtles, so my cousin and I decided to check it out. We tried to swim out to deeper water, but the ground sloped so gradually that even after swimming pretty far, it was maybe 3ft (1m) deep. Even so, it was so cloudy that I could barely make out the bottom! There were a lot of dark spots, but most of them seemed like seaweed until… eek! Was that a stingray?? I turned back to check… and it was! A small one, maybe 8 inches (20cm) in diameter. Apparently, I was emotionally unprepared for an actual stingray. My heart skipped, and I let out an underwater scream in surprise! It scared me half to death, and then my scream scared it (hopefully only) half to death! It shifted to the left, then to the right, and then sped away, like when a person gets scared and looks around spastically before sprinting away. Once I calmed down, I felt terrible for scaring it so badly. Sorry, little stingray! It was kind of hilarious… but I also decided that I did NOT like how close I was to it without being able to see it.

I swam over to my cousin to say that I was ready to go. She said that she had seen a shark fin and tried to swim after it, but she couldn’t see much, and it disappeared. I got the “I need to get out of this water immediately” feeling, and we sprinted back to the beach. Later, my uncle told us that he talked to some people who had been kayaking where we were swimming, and they said there were TONS of sharks in the water. EEK. It would have been cool if we could see them, but you know how I feel about swimming in water that I can’t see through. Normally, I’m just irrationally afraid that there are sharks. This time there really were! Nope nope nope. Noooo thank you.

This seems like a good time for a few more relaxing beach pics…

Mangroves! These are another super important plant. Their roots are a great place to lay eggs and hide away if you’re a small fish or other critter trying to escape larger predators. This also means that they’re popular with birds who are looking to eat these little fish! And sharks, doing the same.

I really thought that I took a video of this dude swimming, but I can only find pictures (argh!)

Look! There he goes! You can see his tail snaking behind and propelling him forward.

We headed back to town with plenty of time to grab our bags and head to the dock before our ferry departed. The entire organizational system for ferry boarding is a disaster, but I’m not going to go into that (you’re welcome). Just know that my calling that mess a “system” is incredibly generous. The chaos drove my engineering mind insane (I have approximately 1000 ideas for how to improve it). We ended up on a ferry with a “floating casino” sort of vibe. The only two windows were blue and dolphin-shaped, casting bluish light across the interior, and the seating was a plush, wavy bench that wound around the perimeter. Before we left, a guy walked around with a roll of plastic bags for anyone worried about getting seasick… hehehe that’s comforting, right? We had a bumpy start, but after the captain came down and moved some people around to better balance the boat, it was much smoother! Thank goodness because the ride was maybe 2.5 hours, and I don’t think I could have taken another ferry ride like the one from San Cristobal to Santa Cruz (where I closed my eyes and pretended that I was totally comfortable while repeating to myself, “You’re fine. Your stomach is fine. No, your face doesn’t feel hot. You don’t feel queasy. I’m sure we’re almost there.”).

The ferry took us from Puerto Ayora, Santa Cruz to Puerto Villamil, Isabela.

Next time, get ready for more adventures on a new island!

Las Grietas and Los Gemelos – explore more of Santa Cruz and learn about the crazy volcanic activity that created some of the island’s most interesting features.

Kicker Rock – for more adventures of swimming in cloudy water with definite but invisible shark companions…

San Cristobal Highlands – investigate other Galapagos claims of “world’s most beautiful beach” and check out the San Cristobal tortoise conservation center.

Diamond Beach – check out this beach in Iceland that may give Tortuga Bay a run for its money… though in a VERY different way!

Española Island – meet some especially colorful members of the marine iguana family.

Santa Cruz – Las Grietas and Los Gemelos

Posted on December 30, 2020 by Lark

We had one “free day” worked into the schedule while we were on Santa Cruz, and like before, that didn’t mean “do nothing day”. My aunt had a whole list of things that we could see on the island without a tour, so we plotted a route and headed out for another very long day.

Here’s the location of Santa Cruz in relation to the other Galapagos Islands! It’s the second largest island, about 20mi/32km wide x 25mi/40km long.

Santa Cruz is the second largest island in the Galapagos archipelago and is a “shield volcano”, like many of the other Galapagos islands. This means that there wasn’t an explosive eruption that formed it (exactly what it sounds like/what you likely imagine when you think “volcanic eruption”). Instead, there was an “effusive eruption” which means that low-viscosity lava flowed steadily for a period of time. Since the lava is extra “flowy”, it spreads out farther and results in a land mass with a much more gradual slope than would result from an explosive eruption. So lava steadily accumulates in layers, building a short and flat-ish island, called a “shield volcano” because it has a similar shape to a round shield lying on the ground.

It’s a very ecologically diverse island, the only one in the Galapagos with six different vegetation zones. I was amazed once again by the difference between the coastal areas and the highlands, but we’ll get to that later. Anyway…

On the way to our first official stop of the day… Puerto Ayora had some very thematic Christmas decorations. I guess the reindeer get a little help from the locals when delivering presents to the islands!

Also, I know that I wasn’t at the birth of baby Jesus, but I don’t know about this rendition… Sea lions, frigatebirds, tortoises, and blue-footed boobies? (Also, the green and brown stuff on the ground is broken glass. There’s a lot of interesting recycling happening on the islands.)

Our first stop was the local fish market. This is where the fishermen bring in their catches, and there are big, concrete tables where they’re sorted and prepared for sale. If you like fresh fish or lobster, this is the place to be. I personally don’t like fish, fresh or otherwise, but I do always enjoy watching people at work (in a totally non-creepy way), skillfully going about their business. The major tourist draw is the photo op, of course. The fish attract all kinds of critters hoping for scraps… sea lions and an assortment of birds that hang around and, if they’re feeling especially cheeky, try to snatch fish right off the tables. The fish attract the birds, the birds attract the people, and you’ve got yourself a crowd!

Lobsters! Lobster fishing is strictly regulated in the Galapagos. The season lasts from September 1 – December 31 each year. These are red spiny lobsters and are the variety most commonly found in the Galapagos.

Taking pictures of tourists taking pictures of this lady doing her job.

Sea lion trying to get some pity scraps. This lady isn’t buying it.

Breaking the two-meter rule (only once, I promise!)

We weren’t there at prime time, so things were pretty quiet. That was fine with me! When everyone was ready to move on to the next adventure, we headed for the dock. Our destination was “Las Grietas”, or “the cracks”, which is a deep crevice that was created when the lava forming the island cooled and contracted. This particular crack falls at the junction of an underground river and the sea, so it’s filled with brackish water (mix between fresh and saltwater). There isn’t a large, clear passage to the ocean, but there is enough space for water and fish to trickle in. No sharks, though!

We passed this funky house on the way to the dock!

No clue what this kid was doing, but apparently we were all entertained by it (pic by my uncle)

The only way for a human to get to Las Grietas is through a boat ride/walking combination. You can’t drive there. You can’t walk the entire way. You can’t boat the entire way. You take a water taxi from the main dock in Puerto Ayora, cross the harbor, and walk about 30 minutes from there. You can also take a boat a liiittle farther and save yourself maybe 15 minutes of walking, but then you still have to walk the final stretch.

We passed these salt mines along the way! Saltwater comes in with the tide and fills the area, and after the water evaporates, people harvest the salt that gets left behind (you can see the white rings of salt around the pools in the picture).

With my aunt and cousins and some pretty flowers we passed on the walk (pic by my uncle)

Las Grietas is about 330ft/100m long and consists of three “pools”. As I researched, it seemed like everyone (everyone who seemed even mildly adventurous, that is) agreed that you should absolutely go all the way to the third pool. My uncle, cousin, and I geared up in our fins and snorkels and headed down a set of wooden stairs to the first pool. This is the biggest one (at least in my estimation), and it’s crowded because that’s as far as most people go. Not us! There’s not much to see in the first pool, so we swam to the end pretty quickly. From there, we climbed over a section of slippery rocks (only falling once… eh, maybe twice… but always very gracefully, of course) into the small, rocky, shallow second puddle (it’s way too small and shallow to be called a pool, so I’m amending the name). If I didn’t know better, I would have thought we’d reached the end. But no.

To reach the third pool, you can either climb over some large boulders or swim about 5 feet through an underwater “tunnel” beneath them. The tunnel route is way easier, but at the time, we didn’t know that was an option. (I think it’s semi-common knowledge, so I’ll take the blame for that intelligence failure.) We only found it by chance. At the rocky transition from the first pool into the second, I tossed my fins ahead so that I could use my hands as I crossed over the rocks… and when I reached the puddle, one of them had vanished. Uh oh. They’re bright orange floating fins, so I knew it had to be on the surface, but then why couldn’t I see it?? After some minor panicking and intense searching, I found it wedged between two rocks. There was clearly a current that carried it there, and a quick peek underwater revealed the tunnel! So, it was two exciting discoveries in one. I got my fin back, and we found an easier route into the third pool! My uncle had already scaled the boulders to get there… whoops! But at least the return trip was easier.

Well, it was quite the journey, but we finally made it to the third pool. It’s slightly smaller than the first, but we had it all to ourselves. It was awesome. The water was incredibly clear and calm, all the way to the bottom, maybe 10-15ft (3-5m) down. As soon as we passed that last boulder wall, it was like the world around us ceased to exist. Underwater, the silence was the ear equivalent of being in a pitch-black room. And then the fish! Everyone said that there’s not much to see underwater, but I disagree. Sure, there were no sharks or turtles, but there were a few schools of BIG fish cruising around… like at least a foot long (30cm), and many of them were probably bigger than that. The best part was that they were almost completely unfazed by us. I dove down and swam along next to them. They looked surreal… like they were mechanical fish or were too three-dimensional to be real. And just the general ambiance… I don’t know exactly how to explain the feeling, but from now on, if I need to imagine a place where I feel completely at peace, I’m going to be there, suspended on the surface of the clearest, quietest water with hyper-realistic fish gliding by.

We had the pool to ourselves for a while, and it was glorious. By the time another group showed up (and completely shattered the serenity), we were about ready to go anyway. We made our way back under the boulder, through the puddle, over the slippery rocks, across the first pool, and up the stairs (which were now about a million degrees after baking in the sun… and I had no shoes at the bottom so that was really great planning on my part).

Loving life. I didn’t bother taking my waterproof case-equipped phone, so all of these pictures were taken by my uncle or cousin

GIANT fish hiding in the rocks along the edges of the third pool. I glimpsed something light as I swam by and got in closer to investigate. I’m a terrible estimator, but he MUST have been more than 2 feet long (60cm). I think. And I know I said that I didn’t take any pictures, but for this one, I borrowed my cousin’s camera and got right up in this fish’s face because it was too dark to see it very well at the time, and I really wanted to know what he looked like.

Just looking at this picture is making me all sorts of calm

Okay just one more picture (also because I have practically no pictures of me from this entire trip, so here are 90% of them in one go, all with me looking especially cool in my snorkel)

From there, we walked to the water taxi stop and then boated back to town. The water taxis, by the way, are hilarious. The ride back to town went something like: get on water taxi, stop by a boat anchored in the harbor, pick up empty water jugs, drive to another boat, pick up person, drive to another boat, drop off empty water jugs and pick up bag, drive to another boat, drop off person, drive to dock, give bag to person waiting on dock, let off passengers. I never understood what was going on, but I was always entertained.

After a quick stop at our hotel, we headed back out in search of a (regular) taxi to take us to the highlands. On Santa Cruz, people generally go to see two things in the highlands: a tortoise sanctuary (of course) and a pair of craters called Los Gemelos. Fredy, our taxi driver, suggested that we visit Los Gemelos first, and I figured he knew better than any of us since he’s probably taken people to both places a million times.

Los Gemelos, or “the twins”, are two craters formed by collapsed magma chambers. What are those? When lava is flowing, it flows fastest at the middle. The lava at the top and edges cools and hardens more quickly while the lava beneath continues to flow. Eventually, the eruption stops, halting the supply of lava and leaving behind empty space beneath the hardened lava. This can take the form of a tube-like cavity (lava tubes) or, in the case of the craters, large, open chambers. At Los Gemelos, through a combination of erosion and seismic activity, the unsupported lava above the chambers became unstable and collapsed, forming the twin “craters” that you can visit today.

This sign by the craters roughly shows their shapes/relative sizes. I read somewhere that the larger one (I assume?) is about 1 mile in diameter (1.6km) and 920 feet deep (280m).

In the surrounding forest (pic by my uncle)

None of us really knew what to expect from Los Gemelos, but they were really cool! It’s like being in another universe because they’re in the middle of the largest Scalesia forest in the Galapagos. This is an important habitat for tropical flowers like bromeliads and orchids as well as mosses, lichens (a fungus/algae mashup), and birds. It feels like you’re in the middle of the rainforest! Since the craters collapsed a long time ago, they’ve filled in with plants as well.

Impossible to fit the entire crater into one picture without a wide-angle lens or a panoramic photo

And then this forest… can you believe this is the same island where those barren salt mines were??

The tree to the right of the path in this picture reminded me of a giant spider. Eek! But the moss hanging off of those branches is the craziest thing!!

The density of the fog changed pretty quickly, but there were times when it was hard to even see the opposite side of the craters

After our hike around the craters, we loaded back into the taxi and headed to El Chato, one of the private tortoise reserves on Santa Cruz. It used to be a ranch, but for the last 20 years or so, they’ve been working to restore native vegetation and create a natural habitat for the tortoises (more about that in the next post!). Tortoises aside, they also have some lava tubes that you can walk through! It’s kind of creepy to think that you’re walking through a giant pipe where hot-enough-to-vaporize-you lava used to flow! But also… how cool!?

This is weird. There’s a lower tunnel area where you can see my cousin walking ahead, and then there’s a layer of cooled lava and ANOTHER cavity above that. Very confusing looking.

I loved looking at the shapes of the walls!

Next time, we’ll talk about the tortoises at El Chato and some final Santa Cruz adventures!

San Cristobal Highlands – compare the Scalesia forest and lava craters of Santa Cruz to the highlands and crater lake of San Cristobal!

Kicker Rock – snorkel in the open ocean surrounded by some very NOT clear water (and probably over a bunch of sharks… eek!)

North Seymour Island – check out the weird bird life and barren landscape of North Seymour Island, just north of Santa Cruz

North Seymour Island

Posted on December 16, 2020December 16, 2020 by Lark

The day after we explored San Cristobal’s highlands, we made our first relocation from San Cristobal to Santa Cruz, the second largest island in the Galapagos and home to their most populous city, Puerto Ayora. After a few days in Puerto Baquerizo Moreno, San Cristobal (~7,000 inhabitants), Puerto Ayora (~12,000 inhabitants) made me feel like a small-town girl in the big city. It was a bit jarring. Also a bit jarring was the ferry ride… I spent most of it with my eyes closed, praying it would end soon and lying to myself by saying that I didn’t feel the least bit seasick. (And like I’ve said before, I do NOT get seasick easily. It was rough.)

To keep you oriented, we left from San Cristobal and headed west to Santa Cruz! As you can see, lots of open water which probably didn’t help with the ride’s seasickness factor.

The next morning, we were back at it with another tour, this time going to the uninhabited island of North Seymour, north of Santa Cruz. We had a bit of a hybrid journey this time. Puerto Ayora is on the southern coast of Santa Cruz, so we took a 45-minute bus ride from town to the island’s northern port, and from there, we took a 40ish-minute boat ride to North Seymour. Well, actually “yacht ride”. This was a fancy tour which meant hellooo, luxury! The yacht had real bathrooms, air conditioning, and an upper deck! That was the best part. Our family claimed the upper deck while everyone else sat inside in the A/C. Whew! Too much luxury like that and I’m going to be ruined for traveling on the cheap! Just kidding, but it was a fun one-time thing.

We started in Puerto Ayora, took that one road to the north end of the island, and then yachted to North Seymour (circled). Baltra (beneath that) is the location of one of the airports, and that’s where the land iguanas came from (you’ll know what I’m talking about soon).

Unlike many of the archipelago’s islands, North Seymour was NOT formed by a volcanic eruption. It’s a seismic uplift, formed when the Earth’s crust was pushed up by the lava underneath it over the course of thousands of years until it lifted above sea level, forming an island. As a result, it’s very flat (the max altitude is only about 90ft/28m) with dramatic cliffs along the shoreline, and evidence of its previous life as part of the seafloor is abundant, with shells and large rocks scattered across the island. It’s also small, only about 0.75 square miles (~2 square kilometers) in area, and there’s not much vegetation. It’s very low and bushy, but that doesn’t bother the TONS of birds that nest there during the year.

Let’s talk about these plants. They look super dead, right? They’re not. They’re Palo Santo trees, and they lose their leaves to help them survive when there’s not enough water. So as soon as the rainy season comes, they bloom! Palo Santo is considered a cleansing/purifying plant, and its oil is used for aromatherapy and incense.

Once we reached the island, we started off with a walking tour. North Seymour is known for being a great fishing and nesting site for birds, especially frigatebirds. They’re the weirdest! The males have these red chest pouches that inflate during mating season because what could be more attractive than that? The mating ritual is the weirdest thing. We didn’t see it, but my goodness, look up a video because I can’t possibly explain it. Nonetheless, I will try. The males build nests. They sit in their nests, puff up their chest pouches, spread their wings, and then make this noise that can only be described as extraterrestrial. Their entire bodies vibrate from the effort. And the females fly around until they find a nice nest and pouch, and when they land nearby, the males wrap their wings around them to tell other males to scram. The exciting thing about North Seymour is that you can find frigatebirds nesting year-round whereas, in other places, it’s a rare treat to get to see a puffed frigatebird (unofficial terminology).

Okay, opinions, everyone. Does this look comfortable?

Fun fact, it takes about 20 minutes for a chest pouch to inflate

Someone asked the guide what would happen if the pouch was punctured. All he said was, “It would be very bad.”

I’m sure that pouch is great for cutting down on wind-resistance… not.

And if you’re wondering what it looks like uninflated… I think seeing it like this makes the size of the inflated pouch even more amazing.

There are actually two varieties of frigatebird found on North Seymour, the magnificent frigatebird (which is endemic to the Galapagos) and the great frigatebird (also found elsewhere). They look very similar, especially the males. The magnificents are slightly larger with a purplish sheen to their black feathers, and the greats have a slightly wider wingspan and a greenish sheen. They also make different noises, and the great frigatebirds go farther from land to get their food, which is good because then they don’t compete with one another for resources. The guide pointed out both varieties and I think I have pictures of each, but don’t quote me…

I’m no expert, but this sure looks like a great frigatebird to me (greenish feather tint).

And this one looks like a magnificent (purplish feather tint).

The females are easier to tell apart. The magnificents have a blue eye ring and a black throat, while the greats have a red eye ring and a white throat. I don’t think we saw any great females, or at least I haven’t found any in my photos.

Female frigatebird in flight (I think? I’m really not great at this whole birding thing). They’re majestic.

Of course, the females don’t have quite the same pizzazz as the males.

And we saw some chicks and immature frigatebirds which I attempt to identify below…

An immature frigatebird. And I don’t know this for sure, but I think it’s a great frigatebird because of its rust-colored head. But I could definitely be wrong on that.

I really feel like this one is looking at me.

Anyway, the chest sack isn’t the only odd thing about frigatebirds. They don’t have waterproof feathers, so unlike many of the other Galapagos birds, they can’t go diving for their food. Instead, they eat things off the surface, like crabs, squid, flying fish, small turtles, etc. and sometimes they steal food from other birds, earning them the nickname “pirate birds”. At first, I thought this meant that if another bird was carrying a fish or something, they’d make them drop it. NOPE. Well, that is part of it. They dive-bomb other birds and make them drop their prey… but more disturbingly, they sometimes make the other bird regurgitate its food, aka they eat bird vomit. How do they do this? Either by chasing them around until they’re so stressed out that they throw up, or by grabbing them by the tail feathers and shaking them around until achieving the same result. And then they swoop down and grab their “food” (ew) before it hits the water. Nature is gross.

I know it’s hard to tell, but these frigatebirds are sitting on nests. They often re-use nests from year to year and sometimes steal nest materials (not shocking considering they don’t seem to understand ownership boundaries like “after I’ve swallowed a fish, it’s mine”).

Other interesting/less gross facts… they have a really high wingspan to body weight ratio which makes them great at gliding and maneuvering. Their wingspans are up to 8ft (2.4m)… which is crazy. Their bodies are about 3.5ft long (1m), so it’s not like they’re small birds in any way, but still. They can spend more than a week floating on wind currents! They also care for their babies longer than any other bird. A baby starts to fly at around 4-6 months, but the mother continues to supplement its diet for another 6 months to a year+, depending on oceanic conditions (in years when it’s harder to find food, the length of care is usually longer).

The male frigatebirds help after the baby hatches, though they may not stick around for quite as long as the mom. This guy is currently watching over his little puff ball.

The male frigatebird definitely understands what it means to suffer for the sake of beauty.

Blue-footed boobies are also a big attraction of North Seymour, and people come to watch their weird mating ritual which, most famously, includes some dancing. They lift their feet one at a time like they’re casually trying to show off their vibrance, bow their heads, maybe give a gift, and finish off with a finale of wing-spreading and head-lifting. If a female is into it, she goes over and joins the dance. Unlike frigatebirds, blue-footed boobies are great hunters which, unfortunately for them, makes them a frequent target for the pirate birds.

I’m no expert, but I don’t think this blue-footed booby was very happy to have us around. But look! Eggs!

This blue-footed booby is still immature, which you can see because he’s still mostly brown. The adults have a lighter head (see next picture). He’s also clearly not ready for mating because his feet are so dull. They get much brighter when it’s time to find a mate.

Booby and alien-bird booby baby. You can see that this adult’s head is much lighter than the dark brown immature booby from the previous picture. And look at those feet!

Even as an uninhabited island, North Seymour has had its share of issues with non-native species messing with the island’s ecosystem, primarily rats. There was a big effort to eradicate the rat population in the 2000s, and by 2007, the island was rat-free. About 10 years later, though, in 2018, more rats were discovered. You may be wondering how they got there… Did you know that rats can swim? Some can swim for over a MILE (1.6km). Baltra Island, home to one of the islands’ airports, is within swimming distance, and it’s thought that they came from there.

The rats are a big problem. They eat iguana and bird eggs (and many of the birds on North Seymour literally just nest on the ground), gnaw on the plants and eat their seeds, eat pollinating insects, and reproduce quickly… basically, they wreak complete havoc on the ecosystem. Usually, poison would be spread over the island using helicopters, but that’s crazy expensive and imprecise for such a small land area. So, in early 2019, they tried something new and used drones to drop the poison! This was great because they’re much more precise which means that they could minimize water contamination, and it’s much cheaper than renting a helicopter! The island was closed for a few months, and they think that the rats have been completely eliminated which is pretty cool. They’ll keep monitoring the island for the next two years to see how the ecosystem is recovering and to make sure that no rats return.

Imagine swimming in that beautiful water, looking over, and seeing a RAT swimming next to you. Ew ew ew!

I think it’s really interesting to hear about how they’re trying to repair these island ecosystems because it’s such a unique situation. Since they’re islands, you can actually contain the problem and control more of the variables, unlike if you’re working with a larger landmass. Another sort of “test case” that happened on North Seymour involves land iguanas. There are a LOT of land iguanas on the island, but interestingly, they actually aren’t native. These iguanas originated on Baltra Island, but Baltra had a goat problem that was damaging the land iguana habitat and population, so in the 1930s, a few were brought over to North Seymour to give them a better chance of survival. By the 1950s, land iguanas were extinct from Baltra… but since they were thriving on North Seymour, some of them were taken to be reintroduced! The North Seymour land iguanas have also been taken to Santiago, another island where the native population became extinct, and have repopulated there as well.

Land iguana on the moon. Seriously though, what a trippy landscape!

Land iguanas are larger than the marine iguanas that we’ve seen before, and unlike marine iguanas, which you’ll see in large groups on the coast, it’s rare to see more than one at a time. They are vegetarians and mostly eat cactus pads which seems like a painful diet, but they have really thick skin in their mouths, so they can eat them spines and all!

I have a lot of pictures of this guy and had trouble choosing just one… so I didn’t.

He must have been doing a lot of push-ups because he has some chest definition (kidding, I don’t know if land iguanas do that… but some lava lizards actually do defend their territory via push-up competitions, so it’s not completely out of the realm of possibility).

Marine iguana. You can see that the coloring is COMPLETELY different from the land iguana.

Before heading back to the boat, we walked along the beach, looked at some sea turtle nests, and visited a lake where the guide said you can sometimes see flamingos! We lucked out, and even though it was suuuper far away, it was still awesome to see.

Sea turtle nest. The mom sea turtle comes out of the water at night, digs a body pit and then an egg chamber, plops out the eggs, covers the egg chamber and does some camouflage with dry sand to try to hide the nest from predators, and then she gets back into the ocean and says, “Later, eggs! Good luck!” And they definitely need luck to make it to adulthood. First they need to even hatch, then they need to make it to the ocean without being eaten, and then they need to grow big enough to not be an easy target for every bird and other predator they might encounter.

We had a little time for swimming and snorkeling before the end of the tour, too. I didn’t take my camera with me, and even though there were some cool fish, I didn’t regret it because the water wasn’t very clear. You’ll just have to imagine.

After that, we headed back to Santa Cruz, and everyone was exhausted by the time we got back to the hotel. We did go on one more adventure that night… my aunt read that you can sometimes see sharks from the end of the pier because the lights illuminate the water, so we figured we might as well check it out (especially since I thought it might be good to see a shark from outside of the water to help me get over my paralyzing fear of them). We weren’t expecting much, but we actually did end up seeing a few!! They were maybe like 3 feet (1m) long, and it was hard to see because it was dark, but still, how cool! Enjoy my super clear photo… I promise it’s a shark.

Española Island – check out more Galapagos birds, including the waved albatross and Nazca booby!

Welcome to the Galapagos – learn about the formation of the Galapagos Islands and a bit about their early human history.

Santa Cruz – Tortoises and Tortuga Bay

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North Seymour Island

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