Greetings from the Galápagos Islands, where the blue-footed booby shows its colors

Far-Flung Postcards is a weekly series in which NPR’s international correspondents share snapshots of moments from their lives and work around the world.

I admit I am obsessed with the blue-footed booby. I saw the turquoise-accented avian for the first time on my recent reporting trip to the Galápagos — the Pacific volcanic islands some 600 miles off the coast of Ecuador, and home to many of the world’s blue-footed booby breeding couples.

I get why nearly two centuries ago, Charles Darwin was fascinated by these seabirds and gave them top billing in his theory of evolution. I couldn’t get enough — equally amused at their gangly gait on land (their name comes from the Spanish bobo for “foolish”) while also awed by their precision diving skills at sea. I confess I was equally enamored by their ubiquitous caricatures plastered around Galápagos towns, adorning walls and signposts and all kinds of booby-themed kitsch.

My NPR colleague Aya Batrawy, based in Dubai, summed it up best after seeing a video I’d shared of a booby in clear focus, its neck twisted in a 180-degree pose, preening its rear cinnamon-brown and white-streaked feathers. “Now that’s life,” she remarked, “to be born with perfect footwear and the ability to scratch your own back.”

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