A glorious day in Cabo San Lucas
Today guests awoke as we approached the town of Cabo San Lucas the most southern point of the Baja Peninsula. Eager snorkelers donned wet suits and awaited the chance to swim in tropical waters, a little anxious to try out snorkeling from a Zodiac. As we approached Pelican Rock the excitement grew as people started to look down into the water column. You could look down and down and down still further seeing the bottom at about 60 feet. We were to be immersed in a crystal clear tropical aquarium soon. The sergeant majors and yellow-tailed surgeonfish were out in force coming to the surface to preview their new swimming companions. Surgeon majors can be compared to the fresh water sunfish because they seem to be everywhere. Their wide distribution can be attributed to the fact that they have a diverse diet, which allows them to be at home in the shallow littoral zone, around coral outcrops, or among the prop roots of mangrove systems. We observed these black banded yellow and silver fish picking plank-tonic organisms from the water column, nibbling algae of encrusted rocks, sifting through the sand for invertebrates, surfacing to accurately feed on insects that were unfortunate enough to get stuck in the skin of molecules that make up the air/water interface. While our guests were exploring this interface, I decided to interact on the fishes level and descended in the tranquil azure water. The sound of the sergeant majors eating was only interrupted by the noise of my breathing, which brought me to the reality that I had to limit my stay due to the diminishing resource of air that is kept in an aluminum cylinder affixed to my dorsal side. It was truly peaceful especially since we were the only ones present at eight am before the busy port of Cabo came alive. Those guests that were not snorkeling were either busy identifying birds with Bryan Gates or learning about the flora from William Lopez. In a period of about two hours 24 different species of birds were seen and identified; that’s a twelve-bird-an-hour rate… not bad. After spending some time roaming the streets of Cabo, we were all aboard at 12:30 pm to start our journey in the Gulf of California, with our first stop at Gorda Banks to watch a threesome of humpback whales frolicking on the surface with such antics as tail lobbing, flipper slaps, and fluking. As dusk was approaching everyone was on the lookout for the green flash and the sounds from the guests were like those on the forth of July... ooooh ahhhh....
Looking forward to tomorrow's adventure!
Today guests awoke as we approached the town of Cabo San Lucas the most southern point of the Baja Peninsula. Eager snorkelers donned wet suits and awaited the chance to swim in tropical waters, a little anxious to try out snorkeling from a Zodiac. As we approached Pelican Rock the excitement grew as people started to look down into the water column. You could look down and down and down still further seeing the bottom at about 60 feet. We were to be immersed in a crystal clear tropical aquarium soon. The sergeant majors and yellow-tailed surgeonfish were out in force coming to the surface to preview their new swimming companions. Surgeon majors can be compared to the fresh water sunfish because they seem to be everywhere. Their wide distribution can be attributed to the fact that they have a diverse diet, which allows them to be at home in the shallow littoral zone, around coral outcrops, or among the prop roots of mangrove systems. We observed these black banded yellow and silver fish picking plank-tonic organisms from the water column, nibbling algae of encrusted rocks, sifting through the sand for invertebrates, surfacing to accurately feed on insects that were unfortunate enough to get stuck in the skin of molecules that make up the air/water interface. While our guests were exploring this interface, I decided to interact on the fishes level and descended in the tranquil azure water. The sound of the sergeant majors eating was only interrupted by the noise of my breathing, which brought me to the reality that I had to limit my stay due to the diminishing resource of air that is kept in an aluminum cylinder affixed to my dorsal side. It was truly peaceful especially since we were the only ones present at eight am before the busy port of Cabo came alive. Those guests that were not snorkeling were either busy identifying birds with Bryan Gates or learning about the flora from William Lopez. In a period of about two hours 24 different species of birds were seen and identified; that’s a twelve-bird-an-hour rate… not bad. After spending some time roaming the streets of Cabo, we were all aboard at 12:30 pm to start our journey in the Gulf of California, with our first stop at Gorda Banks to watch a threesome of humpback whales frolicking on the surface with such antics as tail lobbing, flipper slaps, and fluking. As dusk was approaching everyone was on the lookout for the green flash and the sounds from the guests were like those on the forth of July... ooooh ahhhh....
Looking forward to tomorrow's adventure!
