Our day began at 7am, just like any other day out out here, there the similarities would end.. Our morning began with a dry landing on to South Plaza island, where we took a two hour hike around this amazing landscape.

This island was very different to the others, an early morning walk around and we get up close and personal with the large population of Land Iguanas, along with a wide variety of sea birds.  Besides the large prickly pear cactus, this is a pretty barren landscape.. This seems to suit the iguanas just fine. The far side of the island rises slowly to a steep drop of 25 mtrs and a wonderful variety of sea birds with my favorites including he red billed tropicbird, swallow tailed gull and the infamous boobies. Once again, I fell way behind the group and got carried away taking pictures of a rather playful land Iguana, time well spent.

But this beautiful island has so much to offer and on further inspection the teaming with life, the Finches are plentiful, as are the Carpenter bees feeding from the nectar of the prickly Pear cactus.

We made our way back onboard, and prepared to move onto our next stop, where we would once again have an opportunity to play around with some more marine life. But this time we were in search of seals and sea turtles, possibly even some more sharks.

The cruise in the evening brought us around two Islands called daphne Major and Daphne minor, where

we saw such a wonderful collection of birds, my new favorite quickly became the Red Billed Tropic Bird a very distinctive tail and bright red beak seemed to stand right out. All visit on these island were stoppedsome years back after visitors trampled upon some nests on the side of a hill. From there the trip brought us bast beaches populated with dozens of seals lazing in the afternoon sun and then past a beautiful reef here the most perfect wave was peeling from the shoreline, and I wondered how many time this wave had been ridden.

We spent the night between two small islands, South Plaza and North Plaza (the smallest of the Galapagos) and what a beautiful slice of heaven this was, the sun set shortly after our arrival and the symphony began. This stillness of the night, the perfectly calm waters along with the night sky illuminated from the stars.

As night came upon us the dominant barking of the male sea lion (bull) making its presence felt incase anyone wanted to trespass on his patch and bother his dependents. The life of a male sea lion is tough going and often challenged in a loud and brutal battle by an optimistic younger lion. Should the dominant lion lose, he’s title is removedand a new leader is unofficially announced.

After dinner we had a briefing from our guide about our expectations of the next day we once again all decided that an early night was required for the next days activities.

This evening would end in a somewhat familiar fashion, another glorious 3 course dinner prepared by the two man team, and another entertaining brief on the next days activities. Is it possible that tomorrow’s activities will even top the previous few days.. It’s certainly beginning to look like it.

Our guide Willow is giving us so much information on each of the species, but I have a decision to make… The problem is I love taking pictures (I didn’t bring all this gear with me for nothing..) But I noticed that it was a bit of a trade off;  I can listen to every word about each of the species, or attempt to capture a nice image of the subject and learn about it later.. You can probably guess where I stand with this.

We walked for what seemed like a day in the sweltering heat. Soon we were be rewarded. The sound of the ocean was almost refreshing enough in itself, but then we are told we would be allowed to swim here..We wasted no time in shedding our sweaty layers (in many parts of the islands this is not the case, a reminder that once again we are simply guests in these parts). The crabs, iguanas and rays were once again seed to part and clear a path for us. However, the performance was not to stop there.. The big crescendo was about to come.

The Blue Fotted Boobies were about to start feeding. This is a dramatic event that involves an accelerated, spiraling dive, with hardly  a splash, only to resurface with its desired snack. While we move towards the shore, a pair of pink flamingo flew overhead and sent us on our way. What a beautiful day, I often say and I would not consider myself a naturalist, this place is striking a cord within, one that I have not heard before.

Today, we are told is a relaxing day.. (Sounds good to me). We continued along and had more time on the boat in the morning, I didn’t take this to mean that it will be any less thrilling than previous days.

We disembarked on the North side of Santa Cruz to take a hike around the Island. We are hoping to see some land Iguanas and we were greeted all the usual suspects; the seals guided us in, the Sally light foot crabs appeared to be the welcoming committee, before passing us onto the marine Iguanas.

The Pink Flamingo’s are typically not a common sight in these parts and the numbers seem to be heading in the wrong direction. But they made every effort to impress and they stood on one leg and even struck a few poses. We would respond with our applause of camera shutters.

On we went to see some more of these wonderful creatures. Above us, the variety of finches and yellow warblers, Darwin’s Carpenter Bees,and even the Galapagos sulphur butterflies, an intensely yellow colored specimen.

Back to eye level we were presented with land Iguanas and their rather complex mating ritual; where the male would bob his head from up and down, and side to side as the female would also begin rocking to show that she might entertain the ideal, but without guarantee. They took their business to to privacy of the under brush (which fortunately for them, in this wet season is very thick and green). Oh, a little know fact.. The male land Iguana has two penis’s (or is that peni?) To cater for any situation or if the original one my not have hit its target… It’s evolution folks! Darwin was onto something..

We finished off the day with a trip out in the dingys to an area known as Turtle Bay Cove, a mangrove forest that is alive with wildlife, including Sharks, Sea Turtles, pelicans, boobys and Angel Rays.
The guide seemed to navigate the area with precision, at one point we fit through a tiny gap to try and locate out goal of spoting a few mating sea turtles, that quest took is into many odd little areas, where we would saw a plethora of other birds and wildlife.

Meal time has really become a wonderful time, the food is wonderful and seconds are pretty standard. The bar tender, Fransisco was always ready to take our requests for beer, and margarita’s (he would need a little advance notice on these). We would then keep a log of what we had and sometimes towards the end of the trip we will have to deal with the inevitable.

It’s truly amazing what being out in the sun and fresh air will do to you, and the sun just knocks you out. Our guide put on a documentary on the islands in the evening around 8pm and the majority of us were asleep in moments. Bedtime typically is between 8-10, after a few beers we were snoring and being rocked to sleep by the gentle motion of the ocean.

So much of the activity goes on on solid ground, but a lot of what happens here, happens below the stillness of the calm aqua marine waters. The water was just perfect, refreshing and crystal clear.

Within my first few minutes, I was having a tough time focusing on my breathing (it become apparent that I am not a big mouth breather) a huge Marbled Ray came much too close for comfort and I decided to pull myself together. Only moments later to be greated by a very large white tip reef shark. Not sure why I hung around to study this fellow, but it was one of those moments that I can only equate to a deer in he headlights.. He continued along and all I could think of was to follow and see what excitement would follow..Turns out I would never know as he shot off into the abyss. Fortunately I had my underwater camera to capture the experience. They rest of my time was much more subdued, beautiful schools of vibrant fish often surrounded me and would lead me for a brief moment, until they collectively change their minds and abruptly change direction.

Shortly after we changed sites and were exposed to a very different setting. I could not figure out were the the action was supposed to be, I would look down and see more wonderful fish, then take a moment and lift my head only to be greated by a pelican or booby. On a couple of occasions, I found myself swimming side by side with the majestic marine iguana, I never really did get used to this.. I think I was more comfortable with the shark!

It really is only looking back, that you realize how busy a day on the Galapagos Islands can be.