Whale Sharks in Baja!

Welcome back!

Picking up from my last post, we landed late at night in La Paz, which is in Baja California, Mexico. This literally translates as Lower California. It sits directly below the American California and is a huge holiday destination for Americans. Many Americans live here too. Two of those Americans were on the same plane as us and very kindly gave us a lift from the airport to our hotel.

We had one key reason for coming here - to swim with whale sharks! Juvenile whale sharks spend a number of years here before heading off into the wild blue yonder. Swimming with the whale sharks is highly regulated (as it should be) and can only be done on a tour with a qualified guide. We booked our trip and headed off one morning with four Americans

We had to wait our turn to get into the whale shark area as only a certain number of boats can get in at a time. Again, this is good. Finally it was our turn!

We cruised around and it didn't take long to find one. The whale sharks usually swim close to the surface, opening their huge mouths to take in water then they push the water out and swallow the krill.

We were split into two groups and John and I got to go only with the guide. We were given instructions - don't touch them and don't go closer than one metre. One metre! The captain maneuvered the boat into position and the guide yelled, 'Jump!' We lept into the water and swam towards the shadow. The water was a bit murky (it usually is when they're feeding). The guide was telling me the whale shark was just ahead but I couldn't see it. I kept swimming and suddenly an enormous head was right in front of me! I got a fright at its sudden appearance but there was no time to waste. The whale shark was swimming along feeding and we had to flipper frantically to try to keep up with it. We swam alongside it for a minute or two before it got ahead of us. Wow!

We had two more swims with the same animal. It didn't pay any attention to us at all. It was an amazing experience.

The fish in these photos are just hanging around the whale shark. It doesn't eat fish, only krill.

Whale sharks have the weirdest mouths - they're like rectangular boxes when they're open.

I found it difficult to keep up with the animal plus take photos and movies as well as just admire the whale shark, all within a minute or two. This is the best I could do!

It was a fantastic experience. Now I really want to snorkel with the parents of these babies one day!

Near La Paz is a protected island called Espiritu Santo. We took a day trip out to this island. We had the most amazing day!

Our group on the boat were from a variety of countries. There were two people each from Italy, the US, Mexico, England and us from Australia. They were a good bunch.

On the way out to the island we saw so many amazing animals. Dolphins jumped in our boat's wake.

I'm not sure that this video will work. I dont know why they don't load properly sometimes.

We also saw whole schools of small manta rays!

The island, plus others around it, were a geologist's fantasy. Layers of multicoloured rocks crumbled into the ocean.

We boated slowly past a frigatebird colony. Fluffy white chicks peered out from the rocks while their protective parents stood on watch. The sky was filled with these beautiful birds.

Next stop was the famous sea lion colony. These sea lions, particularly the pups, have got used to people and are very playful. The idea is that you snorkel with them and hopefully they come to play.

Dreading the freezing water, we jumped in. Oh my god - it was so cold! We had wetsuits on but it was so cold it took a good 20 minutes before I could even put my head under the water. It's compulsory to wear lifejackets in this marine park which was a pain in the neck but at least they helped to keep us warm!

It wasn't long before sea lions got into the water near us. It was cool watching them do underwater acrobatics.

Some started swimming very close to us.

One them came right up to John and climbed up on his chest! I pulled my camera up from underneath the water to get some photos but there was lots of water on the lens and it ruined the photos. If you look very carefully you'll see the sea lion's face as it's about to climb onto John's chest.

This sea lion, plus one or two others, continued to hang around us. They were sometimes touching us.

Awww, how cute!

We were all frozen so we appreciated that our lunch stop wasn't far away. We pulled up at the most beautiful beach with stunning turquoise water. While we all stood in the sun trying to thaw out, our captain and guide whipped up salad sandwiches and ceviche (pickled raw fish). It was all wonderful. It also gave us a chance to get to know everyone on the boat a bit better.

We stopped agian on the way back to look for turtles. They were everywhere in one particular bay but they were very shy and would hide as soon as they saw us.

We were motoring back when someone spotted a whale shark. We were outside the whale shark restricted area so our guide, a passionate marine biologist, jumped in with it. As we watched it seemed to follow him! It was probably just following food but it got really close to him!

We had half considered not doing this tour but we're so glad we did! The guide and the captain said it was the best trip they had done all year (but then again, they're always going to talk a trip up cos they get tips!)

We met two English ladies on the boat - a mother and daughter - and it turned out that they were staying at the same place as us. We ended up meeting them again in another town a few days later. 

Back in La Paz, we had a good time. There was a huge triathlon happening when we arrived and all weekend there were people wandering around with numbers written on them. I don't think they wanted to wash the numbers off!

Right next to our accommodation was a fish taco joint. Fish tacos are famous here and these were the best value meals we had in all of Mexico. I'm not a huge seafood fan but these were amazing! For the equivalent of about $1.60 (Aussie) you got a piece of fish, battered and fried on top of two tacos. You could break the fish in half and make two tacos. You then went up to a counter and helped yourself to salads and sauces to pile on top. Some people could get mountains on their tacos! 

We had a less pleasant experience at a reasonably upmarket place. Whenever you eat in a restaurant in Mexico, you always get a bowl of corn chips plus a bowl of salsa to eat before your meal. I had often said to John that we would have to be naive to think they never recycle people's leftovers. We had eaten all the corn chips this night when I moved the salsa bowl slightly and saw what I thought were some more corn chips underneath. On closer inspection they turned out to be someone's leftover prawn tails! Someone else had had the same plate of corn chips and had thrown their chewed prawn tails on the plate! Eww!!!

There was no public transport to our next destination, Cabo Pulmo, so we hired a little car. We loved the drive south. We drove through desolate, arid land that grew scrubby, thorny bushes and lots of cacti. It was pretty spectacular.

We stopped at the coastal town of Los Barriles for lunch. This was a weird place. We saw very few Mexicans here, and the Americans we saw seemed a little strange. We ate lunch in a divey looking restaurant. The people in there were all American and consisted of a group of women all wearing identical western hats, an old lady who looked like she'd seen the bottom of way too many bottles and a couple of guys, one of whom let go a ripper of a fart on the bar stools near us! After all that, the biggest surprise of all was that the food was delicious!

We checked out the beach and it was huge! The entire landscape was dominated by sand and sky.

We continued our drive south. The bitumen road ran out and we drove the last stretch on well-graded dirt.

The town of Cabo Pulmo was quite unusual. There are only about 100 residents, but it's a popular enough destination for those prepared to make the drive to get here. The town is very basic but there are a few nice places to stay although they are quite expensive.

The attraction here is the marine park right off the shore. We booked another boat tour but this one was nowhere near as good as our last experience. First stop was the turtle area. We snorkelled for 20 cold minutes over pretty uninteresting scenery before we found a solitary turtle. There were some nice fish though.

We then went to the sea lion colony but these were big adults and I was a bit concerned about snorkelling with them. To make matters worse, we pulled the boat up to a rock to look at them sunning themselves first and were greeted with the sight of a seriously injured female. She had a huge gash out of her back and smaller gashes underneath. My first thought was that she had been hit by a boat propeller, however the other smaller marks indicate she might have been attacked by a shark. Lying next to her was the biggest male sea lion I've ever seen. A fishing hook was lodged in his flipper and a string of red and blue sinkers and lures trailed across his body. It was awful to see. The only consolation is that fishing is banned here so that this is a rare occurance. (He probably swam outside the marine park.) We had a quick swim but only one or two sea lions swam near us.

Next stop was the big one for us - there are huge schools of big-eyed jacks here that form into balls of thousands of fish. We found the place and jumped in, only to find that they were deep in the water and all we could see was a shadow. John got a bit closer and saw a bit more but it was really disapointing.

The day before, whales had been spotted so we looked for them but we had no luck there either. We then went snorkelling over what they called a reef but there wasn't much there at all. Oh well. You can't win them all!

It's interesting the way they load and unload the boats here. They drive the boat onto a kind of frame on wheels then a car or tractor pulls it out of the water.

There were kayaks at the place we rented so we took one out for a bit of a paddle.

We happened to bump into an American guy who lived nearby one night and he told us a far more interesting route we could take to drive from Cabo Pulmo to Todos Santos, our next destination. Instead of doubling back up the peninsula, we could follow the coastal road around part of the peninsula. This road is dirt and has more views. Always up for a challenge, we headed off.

Within 20 minutes, we came across our first exciting sight - a rattlesnake was basking in the sun on the road! Neither of us had ever seen a rattlesnake in the wild before. Note the stripes on its tail, just beneath the 'rattle'.

We only drove another half an hour or so before we saw an enormous snake cross the road and slide up a dirt embankment. I later researched it and found it to be a Baja Gopher Snake. These only live in this part of Baja so it was pretty special to see it. Despite its enormous size (this one was almost two metres long) it's apparently non-venomous.

The coast road was great. We had wonderful views of the scrubby desert rolling into stunning blue waters. Motorhomes camped along the beaches in places.

Our little car handled the dirt roads fine.

There are American communities scattered along the coast. We find these communities a bit strange as Americans (and Canadians) build flash houses in housing developments that are separated from Mexican towns. It's like they have their own little worlds. It looks like the McMahons are moving in here though!

There were many cacti here and I was on a bit of a mission to find the classic "stick-em-up" ones. I found a few!

Generally, most of the cacti have more than two 'arms'.

Cattle are aften a problem on the roads but we found these super-friendly donkeys.

Got something to eat?

We arrived at Todos Santos which was a lovely place. Coincidentally, the English mother and daughter that we had met earlier on one of the boar tours were staying in the room next to ours!

We had a drink on the roof of the Hotel California (not related to the song) and watched the sun set.

Todos Santos was quite a lovely town. Again, it was full of Americans but at least it was a real town.

I love the way the owners of this house took the colour thing to a whole new level!

Just before we left, we checked out a local beach where the fishermen go out from. It was quite busy. Boats are taken to the water's edge by simply dragging them across the sand behind a car!

The pelicans were very friendly!

The next day we returned the car then went to check in for our flight to the mainland. I had booked the flights through an online agency. The airline staff told us that they wouldn't accept the pre-paid baggage we paid through the agency. We had a big argument with the staff there. The final result was that we had to pay again for our bags! I have since sent off emails in the hope of getting the second payment refunded but I don't like our chances! Will keep you posted.

We flew on a rather small plane back to the mainland.

Cheers,

Heather and John