Fernandina and Isabela, 28 Sep 2017
Sunrise over bay at Punta Espinoza, Fernandina We woke up on Thursday the 28th anchored off of Fernandina Island. This is the island made famous by the Planet Earth II sequence with snakes and a baby iguana . Sadly, we did not see any of the snakes. But we saw other wild behavior! Our landing was in a mangrove forest: Mangrove Landing We started with a hike through the lava. We avoided the sand because Marine Iguanas were nesting in it: Marine Iguana nest Fernandina is the youngest of the Galápagos islands. As such, it is still being built, with very young lava flows - its central volcano had erupted only a couple of weeks before we were there. One of the first colonizers of the lava is this cactus: Lava Cactus Our naturalist Fabricio told us that, although the Lava Cactus is a good "first inhabitant" it does not compete well with other plant species. So its role is to colonize, create soil with organic matter, and die. There was lots of scenic la...