Islas Marietas

We went out on a little boat with our guide du semaine Black Bear and got to explore the two Marietas Islands. Our hotel is on the Bahia de Banderas (Bay of Flags), the second largest bay in South America, which leads out to the Pacific on the west. The two islands are at the very edge of the bay, on the boarder of ocean and bay water, and were created out of volcanic lava. Their lava foundation makes the landscape very barren looking; no trees can grow, only short grasses, because there is no soil, and the sides of the islands stick up like grey cliffs with no vegetation at all. But, the lava cooled in interesting forms, so there are a lot of caves and arches in the islands where the water pools up and sometimes “blows” out in great spurts.

On these “barren” islands, however, is a great population of blue-footed boobies, yellow-footed boobies, and frigate birds. The boobies are indigenous to only two sets of islands in the world, the other one being the famously unique Galapagos Islands. Having never seen (only read about) blue-footed boobies, I was amazed by their, uh, blue footed-ness – their feet were really blue!!! Like bright, poisonous-dart-frog blue! And the yellow-footed guys looked like their feet had been caught in a fight between a neon sign and a canary. Black Bear told us that what makes boobies unique (besides their name and outrageous “footwear”) is that they have an air bubble in their brain cavity so that they can dive from great height in the air to great depths in the ocean without any trouble (like, how scuba divers get the bends if they go between different water pressure levels too fast – wouldn’t a scuba diver love to have a brain bubble!). Black Bear also told us that frigate birds have very short legs and very long wings. Their odd proportions make them unable to jump, so they cannot go somewhere very low or they will not be able to get high enough to fly again, especially if they don’t have room to spread their enormous wings.

The Marietas Islands are, as you can imagine, a protected area for all of this wildly special bird activity. Scientists set up research stations and you could even see the communications tower and tent they set up on one of the islands.

We were lucky enough to go snorkeling around the smaller island and saw some pretty amazing fish. The water was so warm, you didn’t even notice it so, all you had to focus on were the colourful life forms floating in the clear blue water around you. Black Bear even dove down and found a little lobster guy and a small oyster to show us. Him and his nephew (who also came for the ride, along with their dog, Neptuno) can hold their breath for a really long time!

Then, it was finally time to say farewell to blue feet, orange fish, and turquoise water. We headed home and spent the rest of the day by the pool.

I guess the only other time I'm going to see blue- and yellow-footed boobies will be in the Galapagos... adventure here I come!

xxo, S