Magdalena Bay
This was a complete day, full of emotion and interesting things. In fact, during the morning we sailed through the Hull Canal, a very narrow and shallow channel that connects the southern entrance of Magdalena Bay with its northern entrance, called by locals Boca de la Soledad - Mouth of the Solitude. As we were traveling north, we saw a unique combination of ecosystems, going from the barren sand dunes and the dense patches of mangroves to the ocean, covering a wide range of animal life.
We admired the strange shapes of the sand dunes, making us think of a Moon landscape, and an interesting assortment of sea and shore birds. Flocks of spotted and least sandpipers, brants, red-breasted mergansers, white ibises, frigate birds, Caspian and Foster's terns, great blue herons, and a couple of ospreys, among others, were seen flying in all directions and also perching on the tallest red mangroves. The bottle-nosed dolphins were a beautiful and agile escort for our ship. At a given time, we crossed the nursery for the gray whale, a place called La Florida, where we shared silent emotions admiring the noble giants tenderly taking care of their newborn babies. We continued on scanning for more "grays".
After lunch we anchored near La Boca de la Soledad, where we conducted whale watching on our boats. The whales displayed a lot of activity, including spy-hopping, rolling and fluke tilting. Several females were also seen with their babies, and almost everybody experienced strong feelings, contemplating the eyes, baleen and bellies of some of the little grays. Additionally, a calf was seen with a lot of mud in its mouth, so we interpreted this sight as a training or as a learning lesson to feed on the bottom of the lagoon.
For dinner we tasted a delicious grouper cooked by the expert personnel of La Ballena Gris, a local restaurant that also offered us the opportunity of singing and dancing Mexican love songs with a group of musicians called El Maestro y sus Chavitos - The teacher and his kids. And the perfect ending for a perfect day was given by the moon, showing itself surrounded by clouds and the mysteries of Baja California.
This was a complete day, full of emotion and interesting things. In fact, during the morning we sailed through the Hull Canal, a very narrow and shallow channel that connects the southern entrance of Magdalena Bay with its northern entrance, called by locals Boca de la Soledad - Mouth of the Solitude. As we were traveling north, we saw a unique combination of ecosystems, going from the barren sand dunes and the dense patches of mangroves to the ocean, covering a wide range of animal life.
We admired the strange shapes of the sand dunes, making us think of a Moon landscape, and an interesting assortment of sea and shore birds. Flocks of spotted and least sandpipers, brants, red-breasted mergansers, white ibises, frigate birds, Caspian and Foster's terns, great blue herons, and a couple of ospreys, among others, were seen flying in all directions and also perching on the tallest red mangroves. The bottle-nosed dolphins were a beautiful and agile escort for our ship. At a given time, we crossed the nursery for the gray whale, a place called La Florida, where we shared silent emotions admiring the noble giants tenderly taking care of their newborn babies. We continued on scanning for more "grays".
After lunch we anchored near La Boca de la Soledad, where we conducted whale watching on our boats. The whales displayed a lot of activity, including spy-hopping, rolling and fluke tilting. Several females were also seen with their babies, and almost everybody experienced strong feelings, contemplating the eyes, baleen and bellies of some of the little grays. Additionally, a calf was seen with a lot of mud in its mouth, so we interpreted this sight as a training or as a learning lesson to feed on the bottom of the lagoon.
For dinner we tasted a delicious grouper cooked by the expert personnel of La Ballena Gris, a local restaurant that also offered us the opportunity of singing and dancing Mexican love songs with a group of musicians called El Maestro y sus Chavitos - The teacher and his kids. And the perfect ending for a perfect day was given by the moon, showing itself surrounded by clouds and the mysteries of Baja California.
