A morning of diving plus odds & ends

<< Snorkeling or diving, Dean wore bandanas to protect his head and neck from the sun.  The nylon skins are very lightweight and dry overnight.  They also made it easier to get into the wetsuits we rented for diving.  The currents were strong, so we did drift dives and the boat picked us up down stream. 

We saw a large school of white-tipped sharks, but now, we were at their level--we dove to 80 feet deep.  This one gave Dean a surprised look. >>

We saw hammerhead sharks for the first time.  They were in the distance, though, so it was tough to get a good photo.  The shark below is a hammerhead, but it's not easy to see the weird, side-ways protrusions on its head where the eyes are. 

The other first for us were the garden eels.  They live in the sandy bottom and come out of their holes to find food floating by and wave in the currents like a field of grass.  They retreat into their holes if you get near to them. >>

<< We saw swimming sea turtles on our dive,  on our snorkels, and from the dinghies.  They are quite graceful underwater, but on shore, they seem quite awkward.

We got up early one morning and took a quick hike across an island to a beach where Kique thought that we'd sea turtles laying eggs high on the beach.   We saw a couple of turtles ponderously making their way back into the sea by the time we got there, but we could see by the tracks that quite a few turtles had been there that evening.

There are also the famous giant land tortoises here at The Galápagos.  Some are wild, but many have been rounded up and put on farms for their own protection.   Early settlers used to eat them, and rats that came with the boats ate their eggs.   So now they are protected like much of the wildlife.  There are a couple of different species that are endemic to specific islands.