Galapagos

A nice day on Isabella.  We canned the hike to top of volcano due to early morning rain.  Instead we went to the tortoise reproduction center where students witnessed tortoise mating in action!  Commentary was quite comical.  Students learned the tortoise gestational cycle from mating to hatching of eggs is nine months just like humans.  We then traveled to a lava tunnel and walked through it with our flashlights seeing mineral crystals of pyrite (fools gold).  We had a fantastic lunch at an Eco-ranch in the highlands.  On the way back we drove by a large lava flow and noted pahoehoe and aa flows as well as ecological succession of plant communities on the recent (10 years) flows.  We now have the afternoon at the beach to relax.