We took Thursday and Friday off work this week and joined a 4 day tour with Jo, Katherine, Nate, Carmen and Monica from the station, and Martin & Teina from port.
The tour was amazing! We met Galapagos Iguanas, both land and sea Iguanas, and swam in the ocean with them too! We swam with white tip reef sharks, thousands of fish, dolphins, starfish, non harmful jelly fish and… sea lions!
Normally, you’re not allowed to go near the Sea Lions, as if you touch the babies, their mothers can smell human on them and will no long Feed them… thus the babies die. We’ve already seen two dead baby Sea Lions. But one of our projects at the station is to make signs to warn the tourists about the consequences of touching them.
But, when we were snorkeling a Sea Lion approached us in the water… he was beautiful! When we dove down into the water, he would dive down after us and circle us in the water, like we were playing a game of chase. He would get so close to us that we could have hugged him… he’d get really close, 30cm away, then make a burping sound in our faces. It was the most amazing experience swimming with these beautiful creatures!
We took a tour around the islands highlands, checking out the local volcanoes, walking/crawling through the lava tunnels and hiking across volcanic craters. Some of them erupted as recently as 1995. we visited lonesome George, the last tortoise in the world of his species. They’re trying to breed him with a couple of females from a similar species, but a 108 yrs old he’s having a few difficulties?!?
They’re lots of tortoise farms on the islands. Scientists are trying to breed them to repopulate the islands. They often collect the eggs to protect them from rats etc, then look after the tortoises until they are five years old. Then they are released back into the wild. Tortoises were often used as food on ships as the tortoise can survive almost 1yr without food or water + is thus very easy stock to keep.
We also saw some frigate birds with their red puffy chests, some penguins and plenty of brown pelicans.
The tour was amazing! We met Galapagos Iguanas, both land and sea Iguanas, and swam in the ocean with them too! We swam with white tip reef sharks, thousands of fish, dolphins, starfish, non harmful jelly fish and… sea lions!
Normally, you’re not allowed to go near the Sea Lions, as if you touch the babies, their mothers can smell human on them and will no long Feed them… thus the babies die. We’ve already seen two dead baby Sea Lions. But one of our projects at the station is to make signs to warn the tourists about the consequences of touching them.
But, when we were snorkeling a Sea Lion approached us in the water… he was beautiful! When we dove down into the water, he would dive down after us and circle us in the water, like we were playing a game of chase. He would get so close to us that we could have hugged him… he’d get really close, 30cm away, then make a burping sound in our faces. It was the most amazing experience swimming with these beautiful creatures!
We took a tour around the islands highlands, checking out the local volcanoes, walking/crawling through the lava tunnels and hiking across volcanic craters. Some of them erupted as recently as 1995. we visited lonesome George, the last tortoise in the world of his species. They’re trying to breed him with a couple of females from a similar species, but a 108 yrs old he’s having a few difficulties?!?
They’re lots of tortoise farms on the islands. Scientists are trying to breed them to repopulate the islands. They often collect the eggs to protect them from rats etc, then look after the tortoises until they are five years old. Then they are released back into the wild. Tortoises were often used as food on ships as the tortoise can survive almost 1yr without food or water + is thus very easy stock to keep.
We also saw some frigate birds with their red puffy chests, some penguins and plenty of brown pelicans.
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