In the early hours of the day we disembarked on Punta Cormorant on Floreana Island. This was the first island that was colonized by Ecuador when the archipelago was claimed in 1832. As we landed on the green olivine beach of Punta Cormorant, we encountered a small group of greater flamingoes feeding on brine shrimp from a brackish water lagoon. After walking at the base of an extinct cinder cone, we reached the beach. There, we found a female green sea turtle in the process of covering her eggs. By accident she tossed away a baby sea turtle from a nearby nest; the newly hatched turtle went straight to the sea and swam away. We were all stunned by all this activity and after this walk, we returned aboard to have breakfast and to navigate to Champion Islet.
This morning and after breakfast, we went on a Zodiac ride along the coast of Champion Islet. Later on this morning we returned to the same place and we went snorkeling in deep waters and it was also the place where we had several outings of our glass-bottom boat.
After a great morning we navigated again during lunch to another region on Floreana Island, to Post Office Bay. There we had Zodiac rides, kayak outings, and a stop on a place where whalers used to leave mail inside an old wooden barrel. At this place, we looked for letters and postcards left by previous visitors. Just like in the times of the whalers, we picked up mail going to places near our homes, and will hand-deliver that correspondence to follow in that tradition.
We returned aboard our ship after another successful day in Galapagos.
