LAND AND SEA IGUANAS DIFFERENT

              IGUANAS AND MORE IGUANAS

land iguana

There are land iguanas and marine iguanas and I did not know the difference until I visited the Galapagos Islands. It was so exciting to see our first iguanas up close. As our cameras clicked away out guide  told us, “Calm down, calm down, you’ll see lots of Iguanas.”

Land iguanas are red, green, and black/brown with a jagged tooth-like spine. They are good size and blend into the terrain unless they are walking on the sandy beach. We needed to watch where we stepped. On South Plaza Island they were everywhere and amazingly we could get within three or four feet of them. Often they would be still and pose as if saying, “Okay---snap away.”

Another day we landed on Espanola Island where the main inhabitants are marine iguanas. The marine variety is black and blends right in with the lava rock. They are a lot smaller and closer to the ground than the land iguana. Again we had to be careful walking on the slippery rocks. The marine iguana is a vegetarian. They live on the algae found in the shallow waters.

marine iguana

Marine iguanas are flat to the ground and sort of spidery and no where as cute as land iguanas.

I’ve seen many different varieties of land iguanas that tend to be much smaller than the land iguanas in the Galapagos.  They ran in the sand along the beaches in Costa Rica.  Even smaller ones ran around our lodge site in Belize.

Sally Lightfoot crabs playing with marine iguanas

QUAINT COLONIAL TOWN

     EL FUERTE, MEXICO

El Fuerte, Mexico is the southern terminus of the Copper Canyon Railroad. We arrived in the lovely colonial city after our week in the Sea of Cortez and after a short flight from La Paz to Los Mochias.

 El Fuerte is a small, old, quaint town which we easily explored on foot.  The city was established as a fort in the late 1500’s to protect the colonists from native North American attacks. We arrived on  some kind of a holiday so we were lucky enough to see a parade and some native dancing in the street. It doesn’t take long to see most of the town as it is pretty small. Many of the stores were closed for the holiday which precluded any shopping which disappointed us not a bit. There was a lovely gazebo in the small town park.

            We took some pictures after the parade and then  decided to walk up to the old fort. It wasn’t very far. At the top after a fairly easy hike I gasped, “What a gorgeous view! I’m so glad we didn’t miss this. That’s a pretty good size river running down there.”

            Lake Miguel del Hidalgo is a man-made lake 15 ½  X 6 miles. The dam  built in 1956 was  expanded in 1963. The lake holds 350 million cubic meters of water and houses a hydroelectric plant which generates 270 million kilowatts of electricity a year.

            Before dinner we returned to the El Fuerte Lodge to enjoy margaritas in the lovely courtyard before dinner.

            The train was due at 7:30 AM the next morning so that meant an early start to have breakfast, check out of the hotel and get to the station.