Even Attenborough can’t prepare you for this...
Katherine Anderson.
Our guide, Rafael leads us along the narrow red beach. He explains that the colour is due to the high iron content in the volcanic rock that has been pulverized into sand. This is geology at its most ridiculously picturesque in the late afternoon, equatorial sun. Sealions lounge about on the sand. They are mildly curious about us but disinclined to get out of our way so we tread carefully around them. Forty or fifty blue-footed boobies are fishing a few yards offshore.
Rafael reassures us that the miracle of evolution ensures that they manage to hit the water at high speed without braining themselves, but I still wince each time I see one take the plunge. I'm also trying so hard not to trip over sealions that it takes me a few seconds to register what I am looking at in the bushes behind the beach. I am four or five yards away from twenty or thirty nesting brown pelicans. They are even less interested in us than the sealions are, not least because they are considerably busier. The colony is full of frantic nest building, courting, mating, and squabbles with neighbours. Pelicans must be among the silliest looking creatures on the planet, but in this setting they are truly beautiful.
Later we sit for a few minutes in silence on a headland overlooking the beach. The sun is sinking, frigate birds and boobies cruise over our heads. I remember that today is my birthday. This beats any party.
