Photographing Giant Tortoises on an Island That Wants to Kill You

“Aldabra wants to kill you,” says Thomas Peschak. “It’s the antithesis of your tropical honeymoon destination—bone dry for much of the year, little shade and ridiculously hot. The coralline rock that makes up the atoll is so sharp that if you stub your toe hard enough it will fall off. It destroyed my new hiking boots in a matter of weeks.”
 But the harsh environment on Aldabra—an Indian Ocean atoll that’s part of the Seychelles—is ultimately what saved its unique giant tortoise population from extinction. Peschak went there to show how a species that had been nearly decimated by human activity could make a resurgence if it was simply left alone.  continue