Day 2 on Isabela, another day that brought the unexpected.
As you can see from our agenda, we were to be up bright and early for a “power hike”, for a traditional postcard shot above Darwin Lake. If you google it you’ll get 100 pictures from the same spot (I have that shot too, as you’ll see below…). There were finches along the way, but not much else in the way of wildlife. Darwin lake is a tuff cone, forming a saltwater lagoon with twice the salinity of the ocean.
Because this was a power hike, I did not take my large camera – just my iPhone. And that was the right call – there was (and is) no need to lug your equipment up to the viewpoint.
Prior to making our way up to the scenic viewpoint, we stopped and visited the historical graffiti. There’s really no story behind the graffiti, no large historical significance. It’s just graffiti.
Walking up Tagus cove next to the graffiti. 
Whaler graffiti 
Darwin lake from the vista point. 
No one seemed to know how these were made, but they are ash nodules. We speculated they form like hail. 
Lava fields off Darwin Volcano 
Way off in the distance there is a mangrove forest (?) where a group of Darwin’s finches are in a battle against a fly.
We walked past Darwin lake, up to another vista point, where there was a helpful stop sign to keep you from going further
Up on this rocky vista point, with a beautiful view of Darwin volcano and the relatively recent lava fields, they told us about the mangrove finches (one of Darwin’s finches), of which there are less than 100 split in 2 colonies, that live down in two small coastal mangrove forests (is forest the right word? A mangrove grove?). The birds are threatened by the larvae of an invasive fly, Philornis downsi. The flies lay their eggs in the bird nests and the the larva feed on the hatchlings. Things are looking pretty bad for these poor finches, and it is quite likely they will go extinct unless scientists and preservationists can discover a solution. The Charles Darwin research center is actively looking into this problem, and you can read more here.
Once back on board, we had a snorkel in the bay (you can see the bay in the first picture above). The water was very murky, as you can see in the still below…
…and there wasn’t much wildlife to see – by far one of the least interesting dives we went on. We did, however, see another solo penguin!
After the requisite snack and shower, we took a panga ride around the bay, and there was some very nice photographic opportunities.
There was a pair of blue-footed boobies on the shore, and for the second one the panga driver did a magnificent job of positioning us just right so that the background was a beautiful contrast of rust orange.
Other highlights included a penguin pair and a baby pelican, which looked like a tiny dinosaur.
During lunch we made the trek down to Elizabeth bay for an insanely great panga ride. The maps below shows our Day 5 adventure
Our afternoon excursion would be a simple panga ride into the lagoon/mangroves of Elizabeth Bay. The island that says ‘penguins’ didn’t have any penguins (it turns out they were hanging out in the lagoon), and I wouldn’t go so far as to call it an island. It’s a small rocky outcropping upon which all sorts of animals hang out, as you can see below. We spent about 15 minutes on our way into the mangroves getting some pictures. I tried really, really hard with this one. We got close and I stood up with the camera over my head, and my wide-angle 16-35mm zoomed out to try and get a ‘birds-eye’ view of the outcrop. You can see the difference this makes in the two photos below, where the left is sitting down, the right standing up, taken from exactly the same spot.
Note the radical difference perspective makes here. Standing up on the panga was exceedingly difficult, though, as the panga was throttling against the swells, and of course there as nothing to hold on to.
My perseverance paid off, as I managed a couple of shots that I like. Of note: There are at least 4 different kinds of animals on this rock: bird (blue-footed booby), reptile (marine iguana), mammal (sea lion), crustacean (sally lightfoot crab). Pretty neat! You’ll also note something we hadn’t seen before – blue sky! An actual sunny day in the Galapagos, rarer even than a Galapagos penguin.
We sailed into the mangroves not knowing what to expect, unlike the landings where we often know exactly what we’re looking for. Here’s what it looks like as you ride into a mangrove… grove?
The unexpected mangrove moment came, to the shock of even Tui, when we observed 2 penguins feeding off a bait ball. We initially saw it from afar, and I was shooting with my 200-500mm zoom without polarizer; none of those photos are very good. As we got closer, with the penguins just off the boat, I was able to switch to my 18-35mm with a polarizer, which removed the glare off the water and enabled you to see the penguin underneath. It’s really impossible to describe, so I’ll just let the pictures and the video tell the story. (Note: the video was taken by my wife who was entrusted with the GoPro during this panga adventure. She did a great job!)
I asked Tui if she had ever seen anything like this, and she said, “never”. Which is quite remarkable, to see something that Tui, who has lived in the Galapagos most of her life and photographed just about every animal and interaction, had never seen before. This was also the time Tui showed us she was human – she had dunked her underwater camera and fired off dozens of shots literally a few feet from the penguins, for what were sure to be amazing photos, but then realized that she hadn’t turned it on. Even the best of us can get flustered in the excitement of photographing something amazing.
The video below shows what I had mentioned in Day 4’s recap – that it is clear the the turtles lay themselves on the bottom to sleep and rest, and as the tide moves in and out over them they accumulate a layer of silt, dirt, and sand. It doesn’t seem to bother them much.
Turtles liked to sleep in the bottom of the mangroves.
This next shot I’m particularly proud of, not because it’s an amazing photo, but because I’ve never managed a sun flare shot. I had wanted to get at least one while in the Galapagos, and with it being mostly cloudy I had very few opportunities. So, as I saw the other panga floating our way, with the sun right behind it, I stopped down to f/22, and finally got my sun flare. I stupidly was not shooting raw, but otherwise, yay!
Finally, at the end of the day, I was sitting on top of our boat admiring the sunset – a very rare occurrence during our trip. About as rare as the giant manta ray – spoiler alert! Or hammerheads – another spoiler alert! I was the only one up top – fellow photographers, there’s more to the Galapagos than the animals! – but it was a beautiful ending to an exciting afternoon. Full gallery here.
