Marty’s photo of the day #4479: Greetings from Bonaire! Today, Deb and I drove to the quiet side of the island and spent the day at Washington-Slagbaai National Park. The park contains a maze of rough gravel roads, giving our rental truck the workout it deserved. I hadn’t driven a manual transmission since growing up in Duluth, but once I got the truck out of traffic and had the chance to practice a bit, it all came back. I haven’t stalled it yet!

Today, I shot some of the best bird photos of my life, but those will have to wait for future posts, as today’s most notable adventure includes the iguana you are looking at now. We had hiked back to one of the two freshwater springs in the park, which were basically mud puddles. I think most people see the puddles, shrug, and hike back out. But the puddles were alive with bird and reptile life.

The first thing we did at the initial spring, however, was sit under a tree to have a picnic lunch. We had just unwrapped our sandwiches when this iguana approached Deb and grew overly enthusiastic about acquiring a taste. So the iguana proceeded to climb up Deb’s bare legs. Need I say that iguanas have very sharp claws? Deb was able to push the iguana away, but not before it inflicted some rather deep, bloody scratches.

After that the iguana hung around with us for the hour we were there and caused no further problems. And yes, Deb thoroughly disinfected her cuts, and later, once we got back to our condo, she applied antibiotic cream to them. Obviously, the iguana had been fed by humans—demonstrating just why humans shouldn’t feed wild animals. Deb named him Brutus.