Magdalena Bay & Hull Canal
Wakening upon a gentle nor’west swell, we sailed from the Cape towards Bahia Magdalena’s “Entrada.” For the last hour, tracking along sand dune barrier islands and then gently turning east to enter a magnificent mangrove-fringed bay. Gray whale sentinels, barnacled and breeching, a dozen minds in the water, peacefully “eye” our advance, no doubt noting our bow-riding bottlenose dolphin heralds. It seems a royal, regal procession, or perhaps rich natural capital, or simple and pure and…inspirational; a source rather than a resource.
Behind the barrier island, dissipating wind chop, ebbing tide, sandy currents carrying seeds and mangrove nutrients back to sea, and then down the long shore drift. We sail north, against the ebb current, tracking along nursing gray whale cows, who hauled into these shallow saltine waters better that their newborn may float up on a planktonic bed and sea bank fog roll. Twenty-two cow-calf pairs. Tremendous Brandt geese flocks, magnificent frigate birds roosting along the red mangrove gallery. Migrating dune fields close in, the Hull Canal tightening, and our local Baja fisherman channel guide easily earns his keep. Our ship’s draft is eight feet, the bathymetry tells us twenty. With an easy spare twelve feet, we anchor for our mid-day base camp.
Dr. David Silverberg gave a PowerPoint lecture on mangroves, their biodiversity, importance and conservation. From here, we Zodiac into the red and black and white mangrove tangle. A negative tide exposing a half dozen oyster and gastropod species residing on the red’s stilts and the black’s pneumatafore knees. Tri-colored, little and great blue herons guarding their water hunt-patch, eyeing the dozen fish species juveniles yearning a return into the protected mangrove root tangle; godwits, whimbrels and curlews witching for invertebrates in the muck. A flock of red head ducks paddling by and then suddenly…the crash of a red egret making a hard red mangrove landing.
Once shipboard, we lunch and are again sailing with a gray whale-bottlenose dolphin procession. At twelve knots, all hands on the bow, a close-by breeching gray behemoth is recorded by the team’s digital still and video cameras. All aboard give a cheer, each team member looking to the others and instantaneously sharing their incredible images. When we see the Pacific swells breaking to the north, intoning this barrier island’s northern terminus, we know our night’s anchor is near.
Following an orange-dune sunset, settling in, with our Expedition Leader mc’ing, we hear about the trials and tribulations of plankton, the history of Baja whaling, the dynamics of dolphin bow-riding, and the joys of chilies.
Wakening upon a gentle nor’west swell, we sailed from the Cape towards Bahia Magdalena’s “Entrada.” For the last hour, tracking along sand dune barrier islands and then gently turning east to enter a magnificent mangrove-fringed bay. Gray whale sentinels, barnacled and breeching, a dozen minds in the water, peacefully “eye” our advance, no doubt noting our bow-riding bottlenose dolphin heralds. It seems a royal, regal procession, or perhaps rich natural capital, or simple and pure and…inspirational; a source rather than a resource.
Behind the barrier island, dissipating wind chop, ebbing tide, sandy currents carrying seeds and mangrove nutrients back to sea, and then down the long shore drift. We sail north, against the ebb current, tracking along nursing gray whale cows, who hauled into these shallow saltine waters better that their newborn may float up on a planktonic bed and sea bank fog roll. Twenty-two cow-calf pairs. Tremendous Brandt geese flocks, magnificent frigate birds roosting along the red mangrove gallery. Migrating dune fields close in, the Hull Canal tightening, and our local Baja fisherman channel guide easily earns his keep. Our ship’s draft is eight feet, the bathymetry tells us twenty. With an easy spare twelve feet, we anchor for our mid-day base camp.
Dr. David Silverberg gave a PowerPoint lecture on mangroves, their biodiversity, importance and conservation. From here, we Zodiac into the red and black and white mangrove tangle. A negative tide exposing a half dozen oyster and gastropod species residing on the red’s stilts and the black’s pneumatafore knees. Tri-colored, little and great blue herons guarding their water hunt-patch, eyeing the dozen fish species juveniles yearning a return into the protected mangrove root tangle; godwits, whimbrels and curlews witching for invertebrates in the muck. A flock of red head ducks paddling by and then suddenly…the crash of a red egret making a hard red mangrove landing.
Once shipboard, we lunch and are again sailing with a gray whale-bottlenose dolphin procession. At twelve knots, all hands on the bow, a close-by breeching gray behemoth is recorded by the team’s digital still and video cameras. All aboard give a cheer, each team member looking to the others and instantaneously sharing their incredible images. When we see the Pacific swells breaking to the north, intoning this barrier island’s northern terminus, we know our night’s anchor is near.
Following an orange-dune sunset, settling in, with our Expedition Leader mc’ing, we hear about the trials and tribulations of plankton, the history of Baja whaling, the dynamics of dolphin bow-riding, and the joys of chilies.
