Punta Suarez, Espanola

Espanola is the southernmost island in the Galapagos. According to my guide book it offers two of the best excursions in the entire archipelago: Punta Suarez on the northwest corner and Gardner Bay in the northeast corner (see next post.) 

Espanola has a wide variety of fauna, including some species that are very different from their relatives on the other islands, and it has two endemic species, the waved albatross and the Espanola mockingbird. The marine iguanas here are the largest and most colorful in the Galapagos.

Our afternoon excursion involved a tricky landing on the rocks and then a 2 1/2 hour hike on rocky terrain strewn with boulders. A shorter hike was offered for those who wanted less exertion. 

Naturally some sea lions had taken over the rocky landing spot so we had to kind of hop around them before we continued on. 

First we spotted a Galapagos Hawk watching over the site. Soon we were greeted by masses of big, colorful marine iguanas that you could hardly avoid stepping on. 

Proceeding along the shore we passed nesting Nazca boobies and then emerged on a waved albatross colony in a flat area in the middle of the island. There are over 12,000 pairs of these massive ocean wanderers that will return to Española to breed every March. We were lucky that they were still there as in December the adult birds start to make their way towards the open Pacific near Peru and Chile. After a few weeks their brood will follow. There were several adorable molting fledglings posing for us on the rocks, a few eggs waiting to be hatched. The fledglings will soon head out to sea where they will spend five years growing and maturing, before returning to Espanola to find a mate. 

Then we reached the southernmost cliffs, an area we the naturalists call “Albatross Airport”. The sun was low in the sky making it perfect to observe these huge birds attempting take-offs and landings. Once you see them land you realize that moving on solid ground is not their strong suit. They wade about in a clumsy way.

Further along the trail as we returned to the landing site we were lucky to see their elaborate and amusing mating dance, a combination of beak-clacking, sky-pointing and loud calls.

They were quite far away so I really had to put my 50x zoom to the test.

We lingered a long time and got back to the ship just as the sun was setting.