Frigate birds and 100 hammerheads- oh my! 6/4/11

Our final day diving at the Galapagos, we had three dives scheduled at Darwin before we headed back on our 20 hour bumpy journey. We got in the water at 620 and the dive was easy but uneventful. Over the morning dives here haven’t been great. The second dive was excellent. More sea turtles came up very close to us, within touching distance. Although the vis wasn’t great, we could still see 100 Hammerheads in a school swimming around! The site was quite amazing and hard to believe I was experiencing it. They took us out on the zodiacs closer to Darwin Island so we could get a better look at the birds and sea lions that were relaxing in the ocean. We could see the different colored feet of the Boobies and we got a closer glimpse of the Superior Frigate birds with their puffed out red chest.

For the third dive we decided to do something different so we dove near the cliffs of Darwin hoping to play with the sea lions we saw earlier. These sea lions had no interest in us, some swam away and others just ignored us. Not what we were hoping for. We then ventured off into the deep blue for one last chance to see the whale shark. No whale shark, but we did encounter a sea lion that was very playful. He came very close to all of us. I swam around with him a bit trying to play. Very awesome way to end the dive trip!