It was a ride through terrain completely different from anything seen up to now. Green. Lush. Mist. Lichens. Mosses. On arrival to Primicias, a farm in the highlands of Santa Cruz Island, we wandered our way through high grass and native bushes looking for the Santa Cruz race of giant tortoises who were themselves wandering. The "dome" shape of their carapace was clearly a superb adaptation to the bull-dozing techniques they use to work their way through low trees and branches, shrubs and tangled vines, thornbush and flowering Sida, a favorite tortoise food in the highlands. The tortoises migrate according to food supply (kind of like us when we hear "the call" for food). Dry season, go high. Wet season, go down. We were in luck, and had several in the area we were visiting. Of course we had "trackers". Victor Hugo (the small guy in blue), machete in hand, led us to where they had located a tortoise earlier in the afternoon.
Darwin finches flitted about, and yellow warblers accompanied us as we walked through the vegetation, which occasionally included the domesticated coffee plant as well. All together it was a successful outing!
