During the night dense fog consumed the National Geographic Sea Bird. Many of us would soon be searching for mother gray whales and newborn calves. These whales leave their feeding areas in the seas of the Arctic and swim for months southward along the west coast led by pregnant females preparing to give birth in the warmer, calm waters that offer adequate protection from their main predators. Here along the Baja California coastline most of them start appearing in early January more than ready to calve. Our morning started by boarding our inflatable boats and heading out into fog that was so thick we could see only about 200 feet. Finding whale blows was a bit challenging, but we didn’t let that stop us. Keeping the sun over our left shoulder, we cruised out into the mist. Soon our journey found clearings and a bit farther along we found young mothers and calves.
The end of January is typically the peak of calving here. Many of the young ones had several creases just behind the blowhole, a sign that they were only a few weeks old, or less. The advantage to having fog is that there were no other whale-watching boats but ours. We observed young calves try and swim on top of their moms as they surfaced. Even though they’d planned their ride into the air, they’d slide off as their massive mothers surfaced. Some tried their luck in the middle of the back, others just behind the blow holes, but they just couldn’t stay on top to make that transition to air and slipped back into their salty home. I wonder if they could have thought, “Oh how pretty it is up there and how much easier it is to breathe. Why can’t I just live above the water?”
The walk across the dunes to the open Pacific Ocean takes about 20 to 30 minutes from where we anchored. We wandered over a spectacular sand dune system that held back the Pacific Ocean from this part of Magdalena Bay. Beachcombing was excellent because few people get to this location. There were two complete dolphin skeletons, coyotes, two jackrabbits, and a maze of crisscrossing animal tracks. The greatest highlight was the views from atop some of the higher dunes that descended to the crashing breakers of the Pacific Ocean.
A Mexican fiesta complete with a very authentic band named “Los Coyotes de Magdalena” played before and after dining. It was a great day and evening to be in the whale lagoons.
