...in Galápagos

Cousin's Rock

Departure from Wolf involved another overnight journey back to the main archipelago. The boat anchored at Cousin's Rock, just off of Santiago (James) Island. Here we are expected to see Galápagos Seahorses as well as being able to dive with the resident sea lion colony. The dive here involved descending to a sandy bottom at around 80 feet and swimming along a small ridge, which was actually an extension of this small islet down into the water.

The entire swim was against a fairly strong current (2-3 knots), and being at 80 feet, you consumed your air rather quickly. We did see a few hammerheads and stingrays along the way, but by the time we got to the area of corals to look for seahorses, it was time to start making our way to shallower waters. This was the first location in Galápagos where we actually saw corals. The dive ended with sea lions greeting us as we ascended into shallower waters, however we didn't see a single sea horse. Turns out the divemaster (naturalist) marked the locations, however, few people had the air left to go and see them. It was either a poorly planned dive in our opinion, or possibly just the result of an unexpected current at that depth.

For the second dive at Cousin's, we opted for heading straight towards the sea lion colony, rather than wasting air in the current on the bottom. The dive with the sea lions at Cousins was our last dive of the trip, and possibly one of the most memorable experiences of our life. Similar to their curiosity on land, they became very playful when underwater. Here, they could swim circles around, blow bubbles at, and generally make fun of these clumsy, land-based beings in funny outfits. The experience was both heartwarming and humbling.

They even went as far as to play tug-of-war with Lisa as she released a rope out under the water. The others certainly couldn't let just one of them have all the fun, and soon 2 or 3 more joined in the fun underwater. The dive seemed to last forever as we tried to squeeze every last breath out of our tanks. Photographing them was challenging due to their speed, and they rarely kept in place for very long, constantly were moving in and out of the pounding surf. These shots were made with a 20mm lens in a housing, but we think a 24mm SLR lens or a 20 mm on a Nikonos would be the ideal setup, as you didn't always have the opportunity to get as close to fill out the frame of a 20mm SLR or 15mm Niknoos lens.