Baltra (Refueling)

After the oil spill that happened here a few years ago, ships go to a few different areas for refueling. The Flamingo and the Eric go to Baltra every eight days to refuel, so we took the opportunity to disembark onto the white-sand beach for an hour or so. A scattered lot of blue-footed boobies were hunting just off-shore, plunging into the water from high altitude at high-speed. Their winged bodies look like futuristic aircraft (e.g. the SR-71 Blackbird) mid-dive, and turn into thin lances just before they strike the water's surface. Truly amazing to watch. We also witnessed a few frigate birds stealing fish from a blue-footed boobie, after it had successfully caught a fish.