Day 12: Lizard Island
October 3, 2005

In the morning, Amie and I headed out much earlier for a hike in search of the monitor lizards I was looking for. We took the same route through the mangrove forest and over the mountain's sandy trail. I was convinced we have better luck before the sun made the island too hot. The first lizard I heard, when it fled our approach on the trail. It made for deeper woods, crashing through the bushes. But I could see his silhouette in the underbrush before he disappeared. We made our way to the other side of the island with no other sightings.

Finally, we spotted our first one as we were heading back to the Makulu. Well, actually, Amie spotted it as I was prattling on about the behavior of Monitor Lizards. He was about 6 feet long, and stretched out across the dirt road we were walking on. He was frozen in his tracks, trying to assess whether we were a threat or not. I snapped a few shots from where we stood. But as he turned to flee, I gave chase in hopes of getting a better shot of him. (Fortunately for both of us, he was too fast.)