Early this morning, we landed on North Seymour Island, one of the jewels of the crown here in the Galapagos archipelago. North Seymour is a flat platform that formed under water and eventually rose above the water line, and it has become the nesting site for some of the emblematic species of the Galapagos. As the mating season has already set in, the different bird varieties are displaying colors, showing off their wings, and making strange noises… it is all to gain the attention of the females, who at the beginning of the season will always play hard to get!
As we strolled around, we had a wonderful opportunity to find the Galapagos swallow-tailed gull protecting recently laid eggs, magnificent frigatebirds with inflated gular sacks were actively looking for females that where flying by. The male land iguanas were displaying beautiful, bright mating colors and shaking their heads up and down to impress the female passersby.
As we got into the water, we were mesmerized by the beautiful color and the excellent visibility—conditions were perfect today. We found may aggregations of tropical fish of many different colors, as well as a tiger sea snake that was pretty big and surprisingly tame, we were able to get very close to it without scaring it away. As we continued snorkeling close to the rocks a couple of white-tipped reef sharks were sleeping on the sandy bottom, while a Pacific green sea turtle came up to the surface to breathe right next to us.
In the late afternoon we took a stroll along the red sandy beach of Rabida, we walked among sea lions as the sun started to go down.
