We had a free morning, so after breakfast I walked down to the waterfront to watch sea lions. I’m in this photo, can you see me?

I really hope you can hear the slurping sounds of the baby suckling.


It looks like Mum is getting a bit sick of him … he’s pretty big. Liam was telling us later that they feed their babies until they’re 2 years old. They won’t look after any other baby. If a mother is killed when she’s at sea, her baby will die on land.


He’s had a hard Saturday night on the turps. Here he is, sleeping it off in the gutter.

This beach is on the main drag. There’s only a low chain link fence between us and them. This is only a small section of the beach and the sea lions.

It’s incredible. There are more sea lions than people here on this island.


I can’t believe I was standing right over these two. Look at how she’s cuddling her baby.


It’s plain to see why I like the sea lions so much. They remind me of Hazel and Scout. He’s wearing an Ecuadorean shirt, because later today, Ecuador is playing in the World Cup.


We were waiting on the dock for our boat to take us to Isla Lobos. The brown seal at the top of the stairs is totally dry. The other, darker ones, are still wet.


Sound definitely ON for this one!

Sound on for this one, too.

We had lunch on the boat as it took us to the island.

Our first activity was a hike. It was very short, but challenging in that the whole ‘ trail’ was made of black rocks. Definitely not for people with limited mobility, so a few people stayed on the boat.


While we were off, the boat people were taken for a ride in the zodiac. Liz from NZ took this shot of a Blue-Footed Booby in flight.


This is the beginning of the trail. Sea lions were nonchalantly lolling in our way. See how close he was to me?


Almost immediately, Liam was pointing out this frigate bird.

It takes 2 to 3 hours for the male frigate bird to inflate that red balloon under its beak. Once they mate it deflates.


Further along, we saw a nest with a frigate chick!

Later, when we were snorkelling, the air above us was filled with Frigates. It felt a little like something from Jurassic Park.

Then came the Boobies.

A Booby with an egg.

A Booby with a chick.

Parents with a chick.

Then we came up to a couple on the trail. The dad was being super protective…

… because their egg had only just hatched. We were able to walk around him, but the little bugger tried to peck me.

It’s a problem here that the Boobies nest on the ground. Rats ( introduced by settlers and pirates) are able to swim across from the neighbouring islands and the babies are easy pickings. Rangers patrol this island all the time.

Definitely an older baby!

How crazy that we are able to get so close to these animals and birds. The Galápagos is truly magical.

Just before we got back on the boat, we hung around with this family. The male was HUGE! There are a couple of females sleeping under that bush, too.
Liam was saying that at this time of the year, the groups coexist well together. But when it’s mating season, each group picks a corner of the beach and sticks to it!

Interestingly, young males who don’t want to be kicked out of the colony – because life is precarious when you’re not part of a group – never develop mature male characteristics. They stay immature, and therefore not a threat to the dominant male. He leaves them alone.

I have no photos for the next part, which on one hand is a shame because I can’t share this with you. But on the other hand, it allowed me to live in the moment.

The next couple of hours were some of the best travel hours I’ve so far spent.

I swam with sea lions and sea turtles.

What a wonderful sentence to be able to type.

“Will we see sea lions?” we asked.
He answered matter-of-factory, “Oh yes, you will.”

For the first ten minutes, there was nothing. We were bobbing around, seeing some fish. I was starting to get despondent, when to my left I saw a sleek brown shape flash past us. The sea lions were here!

They stayed with us for half an hour. There were adults and babies, all so quick and graceful. One came swimming right up to my face, checking me out. Happiness and utter gratitude for this whole experience welled up inside me. How lucky I am!

The sea lions were playing with us, zipping and twirling, always staying just out of reach. It was so joyous.
When we were told to head back to the boat, we all obeyed, though no one wanted to.

We went to a small inlet where there was a beach. We could go swimming or – gasp! – snorkelling.
I was surprised that only 4 of us grabbed our masks and flippers again. Lyn, Brad and I jumped in, while everyone else headed for the beach.

Proof! Lyn has an underwater camera and caught me, a graceful mermaid, with my blue flippers.

She’s just posted these onto the WhatsApp group. See how wonderful it was?

I first saw this sea turtle and I followed him for ages, coming up twice to breathe when he did, seeing his little head poke out from the waves. I kept looking for Lyn to signal to her, or indeed to anyone, that I had something interesting.
Finally she was looking the right way and saw.

I felt as proud as when I saw the grizzly bear in Canada!

And finally, a shot that Bruce caught in the morning.

WHAT a wonderful day.

Dad joke of the day:

There’s going to be a protest against fairy bread today.

Police are expecting hundreds and thousands.