Isla San Marcos
Before we talk about today, we have to mention that we had a wonderful pilot whale encounter within an hour of embarking from Puerto Escondido. The pilot is one of the smaller toothed whales.The captain maneuvered the ship to have some grand side views of the whales. After dinner a number of guests witnessed dolphins riding the bow wave.
Today started with a wake-up call and early morning pre breakfast hike up a arroyo (canyon) of Isla San Marcos. We had a fine introduction to the desert islands of Baja, Cardon, Granbullo, chollas, and pincushion cacti as well as a variety of desert plants for the botanically minded. Vermillion flycatchers, Osprey and Verdins entertained the bird watchers. We repositioned the ship mid-morning to have a better site for snorkeling, scuba diving and kayaking. Divers and snorkelers saw 20 to 25 kinds of fish as well as a number of invertebrate critters: three types of urchins, four kinds of star fish, sea fans, and polychetes rock worms.
A number of people having their afternoon siesta were gladly interrupted by sightings of common and bottlenose dolphins. Our afternoon lecture was "How the Gulf of California Came to Be” by Dr. Joann Stock, the geologist accompanying us this week. Joann’s talk really brought home the intriguing formation of the Gulf of California and the Baja Peninsula.
The area is a geologically complex area with faulting, sea floor spreading, uplifting, subsidence, volcanism and recent(within the last 10,000 years) erosional effects. The traditional Lindblad recap before dinner heard Carlos discuss the origin of the name Baja and California, Brian gave a review of the birds of the day and Clair touched on the bird and plant guides of Baja. Dinner as always gave us the options of fish, meat or vegetarian entrees.
Before we talk about today, we have to mention that we had a wonderful pilot whale encounter within an hour of embarking from Puerto Escondido. The pilot is one of the smaller toothed whales.The captain maneuvered the ship to have some grand side views of the whales. After dinner a number of guests witnessed dolphins riding the bow wave.
Today started with a wake-up call and early morning pre breakfast hike up a arroyo (canyon) of Isla San Marcos. We had a fine introduction to the desert islands of Baja, Cardon, Granbullo, chollas, and pincushion cacti as well as a variety of desert plants for the botanically minded. Vermillion flycatchers, Osprey and Verdins entertained the bird watchers. We repositioned the ship mid-morning to have a better site for snorkeling, scuba diving and kayaking. Divers and snorkelers saw 20 to 25 kinds of fish as well as a number of invertebrate critters: three types of urchins, four kinds of star fish, sea fans, and polychetes rock worms.
A number of people having their afternoon siesta were gladly interrupted by sightings of common and bottlenose dolphins. Our afternoon lecture was "How the Gulf of California Came to Be” by Dr. Joann Stock, the geologist accompanying us this week. Joann’s talk really brought home the intriguing formation of the Gulf of California and the Baja Peninsula.
The area is a geologically complex area with faulting, sea floor spreading, uplifting, subsidence, volcanism and recent(within the last 10,000 years) erosional effects. The traditional Lindblad recap before dinner heard Carlos discuss the origin of the name Baja and California, Brian gave a review of the birds of the day and Clair touched on the bird and plant guides of Baja. Dinner as always gave us the options of fish, meat or vegetarian entrees.
