Galapagos Islands, Day 2

The horn on the boat sounded at 6am to get us up for the panga ride to Bartolome Island, as the sun rose over the volcano on the small, bone-shaped island. I discovered that our damp room had caused my camera to stop working again, which annoyed me a lot, but I took it to the island anyway as it was still semi-usable. The dingy stopped at a small outcrop where we could see a couple of Galapagos penguins. They were tiny, half the size of the other penguins we had seen in Patagonia. We landed on the beach on one side of the island and walked through some typical Galapagos bush land to the bay on the opposite side. As we arrived we watched some fisherman trying to pull a huge haul of fish into their undersized boat, as sea lions and herons were taking their share from inside the massive nets. We watched them struggle for a while but it wasn't until later we learned that what they were doing was illegal. Tourist areas were out of bounds for fishermen. Our tour guide didn't seem too worried about it; it must happen quite regularly, but, in theory, 50,000 square miles (129,499 square kilometers) of the surrounding sea is protected as a marine reserve, one of the largest in the world.

We walked along the beach to the volcanic rock at the end of the bay and saw our first marine iguanas bathing in the sun. They are black in colour to blend in with the dark volcanic rock around the beaches. The crabs on the other hand, stood out a mile with their bright red bodies and beautiful turquoise undersides. They are called Sally Lightfoot crabs because of the way they can hop quickly from one rock to another. I tested the theory by chasing them around and they are pretty light-footed. The people who had been on the boat for a few days before us didn't seem very interested in the crabs or marine iguanas. We find out why later on in the trip - stay tuned. They were interested in seeing the turtle tracks which ran up the beach to the nesting area where they lay their eggs. We also saw plenty of lava lizards (guess how they got their name - they live on lava) and some spiders which lie on the centre of their web in an X shape.

We returned to the boat for breakfast and headed back out to climb the small volcano on the island. We learned about the lava formations on the island and climbed up the walkway to the viewpoint for the most photographed view on the Galapagos. We saw a tiny snake lying under the steps, but the Australians laughed "that's not a snake! It's more like a worm". They were used to seeing really big snakes in their own country. From the top of the volcano it is possible to see the whole island. We could see some sea lions catching fish in the waters below.

Back to the boat again and we got our snorkeling gear for our first snorkel in the sea. As soon as we put our head under the water we saw so many fish it was impossible to count. It was like turning on the TV onto the Discovery Channel. Among the fish we recognised were shoals of angel fish picking noisily at the algae; an unpuffed, spotty puffer fish; a big mouthed, aggressive-looking moray eel; huge multicoloured parrot fish and lots of smaller colourful fish. We swam right next to some penguins which were standing on the rocks above the water. We hung around for a bit to see if they would jump in, but they didn't. Just around the corner we saw a marine iguana picking the algae off some submerged rocks and then it swam back to the surface to heat its cold blood by the sun to get the energy to dive again. A sea lion swam past us briefly and disappeared. This was all in the space of 30 minutes. Dee was getting cold so, like the iguana, she had to return to the surface to warm her blood in the sun. We walked round to the other side of the beach when I saw the head of a penguin bobbing above the water and then diving down. I jumped into the sea and sped off to see the penguin swim underwater. It took a while to locate the penguin but when I did, it had no fear of me and seemed to ignore me as it was diving down trying to catch some sardines. The penguin looks so agile under the water, yet so clumsy outside of the water. It flaps its wings to swim and actually looks like it's flying underwater. I tried to give the little fella a hand by swimming down and herding the fish towards him. We dived with each other trying to catch fish for about 10 minutes, until the penguin realised that I was much too slow and inagile to really do any help, and then it swam off.

I was pretty chuffed by this experience continued to swim towards the peninsular at the end of the bay following George, an aussie from our boat on his honeymoon. We got to a rocky outcrop where the water was particularly cold and a young sea lion swam right up to us. It hovered around us with mild interest so I dived down and did a somersault under water to hold its attention. It swam around me and dived down to do a somersault as well. I dived again and did a twirly move and the sea lion did the same and waited for me to do the next move. I shouted to George that the sea lion was copying me and I watched as he dived and played with the sea lion some more. It was amazing how friendly, intelligent and playful the pup was, and at times, the sea lion came up close and looked with its large, black eyes straight into our masks. Eventually me and George were too out of breath to dive any more and the sea lion swam off. George was cold so he headed back and I continued after the sea lion. I thought I saw the sea lion's shape in the water and swam towards it but it I got a shock when I saw it was actually a large shark, 1.5 metres long. It had white tips on its fins, which meant it was a harmless white tipped shark, so I watched it disappear into the distance before I swam back to shore.

After this experience I had fallen in love with the Galapagos. The animals here haven't been hunted that long by man (the islands were only discovered in the 16th century) and so they don't have that inbuilt instinctive fear of humans. All the land animals are also herbivores, so they have no need to defend themselves. That's why when other species are introduced to the ecosystem, like cats or rats, the land iguana population decreased from 200,000 on one island to about 2000. The same happened to the giant tortoises. The rules on the islands regarding preservation of the wildlife are very strict and we are shown constantly by our guide the effects that human intervention has had on the islands.

In the afternoon we went snorkeling at Sullivan's Bay. We saw many of the same fish as before, but the water was colder so Dee couldn't stay in long. I saw a sting ray then headed back to shore where we started a walk on the lava fields. The lava in this formation is called Pahoehoe which is a Hawaiian name. The lava spread far into the distance and looked like the surface of a black alien planet. The volcano had erupted about 100 years ago and the lava had covered a forest and a lot of the beach. It is still possible to see coloured patches in the lava which are the remains of minerals in the wood and fungus that grew on the bark. The flippers from snorkeling were giving me blisters so was wearing socks with my sandals, which Dee found hilarious. I thought it looked quite good and stopped my feet getting cut by the sharp lava.

We returned to the boat for snacks and a little siesta (all this fun is hard work) and then had dinner, which was excellent considering the kitchen was the size of a portaloo. We watched a boring DVD on the Galapagos which was narrated by a woman who could only speak in monotone, mispronounced English and everyone retired to bed one by one, or fell asleep in front of the TV.