Cabo San Lucas and the Sea of Cortes
In the same way that a Manila Galleon returning from Asia would be carried along by the Japan Current to Acapulco, we moved south through the night and found Land’s End (Finisterra) at the veritable tip of the Peninsula of Baja California. Unlike the galleon, however, we slowed down and turned inward into the Bay of Cabo San Lucas. In those early years an English pirate ship would have been hiding in the bay, primed to rush out and seize and burn the Spanish ship. But we were in no danger. We moved slowly, stopping to admire El Arco, the famous arch, and the other granitic rocks that make up this picturesque formation. A small group of California sea lions hauls out here. We approached them quietly. In contrast, a veritable flotilla of power boats was rushing out, taking an anxious group of bill fishermen, each with aspirations of fighting a marlin, a roosterfish or perhaps a dorado. After extended sunrise views of this most-photographed geological formation, we continued into a secure dock.
Some of us preferred to visit the city, others to go snorkeling in search of many tropical and semi-tropical fish and invertebrates, such as sponges, corals, urchins and sea cucumbers. Others went further east along the Los Cabos coast where a different type of shopping was to be had, or to spend the morning at the “Estero,” a wetland at the mouth of the only real river in Baja California. Here a fantastic 51 different bird species were tallied, including the white-faced ibis (photo), the endemic Belding’s yellow-throat, a peak-crested pyrrhuloxia, a swift peregrine falcon and chortling cactus wrens. In a desert land, fresh water invariably attracts scores of resident and migrant birds.
The afternoon found us moving northeast where we were delighted to encounter a group of humpback whales. Migrating here from coastal British Columbia, these 40- to 50-foot baleen cetaceans spend their winter in the warm waters of the southern Sea of Cortes, where they calve and mate. Our first exciting view was of a group of six adults, bursting to the surface and blowing together. They ignored our ship completely. In previous years we would have heard a few clicks and clacks of bulky camera shutters. Today, those sounds have changed; hundreds of rapid-fire chirps of dozens of digital cameras!
A school of scores of common dolphins (the long-beaked species) added to a day of unlimited joy. They raced to our ship to bow-ride, jumping into the air and seemingly frolicking in the waters near our vessel. As the afternoon wore on, we attended a talk on adaptation of plants to the desert, and thrilled at more encounters with breaching humpback whales.
In the same way that a Manila Galleon returning from Asia would be carried along by the Japan Current to Acapulco, we moved south through the night and found Land’s End (Finisterra) at the veritable tip of the Peninsula of Baja California. Unlike the galleon, however, we slowed down and turned inward into the Bay of Cabo San Lucas. In those early years an English pirate ship would have been hiding in the bay, primed to rush out and seize and burn the Spanish ship. But we were in no danger. We moved slowly, stopping to admire El Arco, the famous arch, and the other granitic rocks that make up this picturesque formation. A small group of California sea lions hauls out here. We approached them quietly. In contrast, a veritable flotilla of power boats was rushing out, taking an anxious group of bill fishermen, each with aspirations of fighting a marlin, a roosterfish or perhaps a dorado. After extended sunrise views of this most-photographed geological formation, we continued into a secure dock.
Some of us preferred to visit the city, others to go snorkeling in search of many tropical and semi-tropical fish and invertebrates, such as sponges, corals, urchins and sea cucumbers. Others went further east along the Los Cabos coast where a different type of shopping was to be had, or to spend the morning at the “Estero,” a wetland at the mouth of the only real river in Baja California. Here a fantastic 51 different bird species were tallied, including the white-faced ibis (photo), the endemic Belding’s yellow-throat, a peak-crested pyrrhuloxia, a swift peregrine falcon and chortling cactus wrens. In a desert land, fresh water invariably attracts scores of resident and migrant birds.
The afternoon found us moving northeast where we were delighted to encounter a group of humpback whales. Migrating here from coastal British Columbia, these 40- to 50-foot baleen cetaceans spend their winter in the warm waters of the southern Sea of Cortes, where they calve and mate. Our first exciting view was of a group of six adults, bursting to the surface and blowing together. They ignored our ship completely. In previous years we would have heard a few clicks and clacks of bulky camera shutters. Today, those sounds have changed; hundreds of rapid-fire chirps of dozens of digital cameras!
A school of scores of common dolphins (the long-beaked species) added to a day of unlimited joy. They raced to our ship to bow-ride, jumping into the air and seemingly frolicking in the waters near our vessel. As the afternoon wore on, we attended a talk on adaptation of plants to the desert, and thrilled at more encounters with breaching humpback whales.
