The time spent onboard in the Galapagos was six complete days bracketed by the afternoon after arrival and the morning before departure. I went up a flight of steps cut into the lava cliff of Darwin Bay, a sunken volcanic crater. Walking along the trail, I saw adult and juvenile frigatebirds, adult and juvenile red footed boobies, and adult and juvenile masked boobies. The male frigatebirds would spread their wings, call out, and puff out their red throat pouches attracting females flying overhead. A pair of frigatebirds in a nest would comprise a male sheltering the female it attracted under its wing.
Juveniles hang around in or near the nest waiting for parents to come back with food.
It was the wet season and everything was green with puddles on the ground. As I neared the coastline, I saw a large pod of dolphins cruising by. The surface of the lava flow near the coast was cracked slabs. Petrels were flitting about in great numbers. I saw the colorful Galapagos dove, lava cactus growing on the lava slabs, a solitary marine iguana well inland from the ocean, and a nonchalant shorteared owl being tormented on the ground by a mockingbird.