Española

Island

By Karey Fuhs

Española, also known as Hood, is the southernmost island in the archipelago, located about 90 km southeast of Santa Cruz. Punta Suarez, a visitor site on the western side of the island, is consistently touted as a favorite among visitors due to its abundance of birds.

Visitors have a dry landing—often having to sidestep marine iguanas and sea lions resting on the jetty and on the adjacent rocks—that passes into a small, white-sand beach. Here you will find one of the distinct sea lion colonies that inhabit the beaches riddled along the coast of the island. From this beach, a long and rocky, tremendously action-packed 2 km trail circuit begins.

Continuing along the coastal trail, you pass colonies of blue-footed boobies and Nazca boobies nesting on the cliffs, most likely spot a finch or two, and probably locate a few seabirds—the red-billed tropicbird or swallow-tailed gull—flying offshore. You immediately learn to avoid the lava lizards darting under your feet and Hood mockingbirds begging for water.

Next, you walk down the rocky steps to the beach where waves crash up on the rocks in a breathtaking display and where hordes of marine iguanas monitor the eggs they have laid between the months of January and March. If you arrive when the eggs begin to hatch, chances are you will see a Galápagos hawk hovering around this area, waiting to prey upon the new hatchlings.

Just beyond lies a flat section of the trail, an “airport” where, from late March until late December, waved albatrosses can take flight, land, await the return of their mates from the mainland, or proceed with their elaborate courting rituals.

Further along the trail is a blowhole, a slit in the rocky coastline through which waves force water to spout about 20 meters in the air. Here you can sit on the cliff and watch the spectacle, relax and reapply sunscreen (you have probably already been walking for an hour!), and watch seabirds flying overhead. The rocky trail back to the beach cuts inland through the dry vegetation of the island, where an albatross or a land iguana may be hiding.

Gardner Bay is a beautiful, white-sand beach at the east end of Española, where you can nap next to sea lions, play in the sand, or snorkel at an island just offshore. Wet landings here can get very wet (especially when the tide is rolling out), so be careful with your belongings. If you walk down the beach to the rocky limits, you can probably see some marine iguanas. Late in the year (October-December) you may also see green sea turtles mating. Near Gardner Bay is an excellent snorkeling spot, Turtle Island.