Map (credit: Wikipedia) of Santa Cruz showing the places we visited today.
Now on the arid north coast of Santa Cruz island, we spent a busy day exploring places like Cerro Dragon, Dragon Hill as well as off-shore islets Guy Fawkes, El Eden and Daphne Major.
Coming ashore on the beach at Cerro Dragon.
Heron on the beach as we arrived.
Dragon Hill welcomed us with a rocky dry landing followed by a hot, 3km uneven walk in search of "vulnerable" land iguanas, endemic to the Galapagos as usual! Charles Darwin described these creatures as "ugly animals, of a yellowish orange beneath, and of a brownish-red colour above: from their low facial angle they have a singularly stupid appearance." We found plenty of them - they are obviously doing OK in this location at least, and you can judge their appearance for yourself. The land iguanas were virtually wiped out by feral dogs in the 1960's, but are now being restocked by captive and semi-captive breeding programs.
Maybe not as ugly as Darwin described, but no fashion plate either.
Fly catcher spied in the bush.
Socrates explained that this prickly pear cactus has been destroyed by feral goats.
Most of the land iguanas we saw were sunning themselves on volcanic rock in the morning heat, and we learned that they get their water from the also endemic Galapagos great prickly pear cactus, which comprises the bulk of their diet. Like pretty well everything else in the Galapagos, they wandered around with total disregard to us visitors, and we had to be careful not to step on them.
Prickly pear cacti provide food and water for the Santa Cruz land igunas.
As we awaited our Zodiac pickup back to Endeavour II, we all had a great time on the beach watching various herons fishing. These long-legged beauties proved to be excellent photography subjects, and one particular model has probably had more photos taken today than Heidi Klum!
This great blue heron stood still for a long time.
Always a great source of seashore colour, the sally lightfoot crabs, more precisely known as "grapsus grapsus".
This blue heron is fishing, and the crab is quite safe.
Beauty in flight, a pure white great egret.
Snorkelling today was around the islet of Guy Fawkes. Here we enjoyed clear, warm water, and the company of sea lions who proved to be much better swimmers than any of us. We also saw turtles and reef sharks, but they are camera-shy and elusive.
Tiny little Guy Fawkes. We snorkelled all the way around it.
A pinnacle, as seen from the water while snorkelling at Guy Fawkes. We swam around the entire islet.
Sea lions were way too fast for a close-up photograph, but it was a lot of fun seeing them go by!
Unidentified fish swimming in large schools around Guy Fawkes.
One of many underwater walls seen as we snorkelled in the clear waters off Galapagos islands.
In the distance certainly, but an amazing shot of a manta ray jumping, seen as we returned from snorkelling.
Just in case we weren't exhausted, in the late afternoon we did a Zodiac cruise to El Eden, another small island off Santa Cruz that looks as though it was named because it looks like paradise. Weather was opressive, skies were threatening, and indeed it rained a bit.
Zodiac selfie in local guide Gilda's glasses.
Threatening skies and some light rain as we Zodiaced around an idyllic island known as El Eden.
Local guide Lulu took us for a late afternoon Zodiac tour around El Eden, while others from Endeavour II kayaked.
Two types of mangroves as seen on El Eden.
Pelicans camp up in the mangroves in between fishing expeditions.
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