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Mexico's Sea of Cortés: Dates, Rates and Itinerary
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It's a fluke — and that's a good thing By LUDMILLA ALEXANDER. printed in the Sunday Oregonian, August 12, 2007

You've seen the whales' water spouts off the Oregon coast. Now reach out and touch
the big friendlies in the warm waters of their destination: the Sea of Cortés

Standing on the deck of her vacation home in Oceanside, OR, Lynne Styles watches through binoculars for the telltale blowhole spray of migrating whales as they swim down the coastline. "Where are the whales going," she wonders, "and why?"

In February, the Chicago resident learned firsthand the reasons for the whales' 12,000-mile round-trip odyssey. Boarding a 120-foot 22-passenger luxury motor yacht in Mexico's Sea of Cortés, Styles arrived at the whales' final destination and experienced a closer encounter with the mammoth mammals than she expected.

The Safari Quest, operated by American Safari Cruises of Seattle, offers seven-day cruises for five months of the year, starting and ending near Loreto in Baja California.

From about mid-November through early April, the Safari Quest concentrates on whale watching in the Biosphere Reserve of the Sea of Cortés. During this time, many species, including humpback, blue, sperm, orca and gray whales, leave the frigid waters of Alaska's Bering Sea and head for the warm waters of Mexico's Baja California. There, the migrating mammals round the tip of Los Cabos and head north on the Sea of Cortés looking for krill.

Passengers on the Safari Quest are all enthusiastic wildlife aficionados ranging in age from mid-40s to active retirees. Although whales are the prime reason they book passage on the cruise, they are equally thrilled to see pelicans divebombing fish at 40 mph and dolphins leaping over the waves.

But the Safari Quest has more to offer than wildlife viewing. The luxury yacht includes a salon with a big-screen TV to watch videos, an open bar, comfortable staterooms, a hot tub on the upper deck, and water toys galore, from kayaks to sailboats to knee boards.

Although guests do change from daytime swimsuits and shorts to casual summer wear in the evening, there are no dress-up nights or assigned seatings on the cruise. Meal times are casual -- and delicious -- affairs, with entrees including huevos rancheros for breakfast, blackened ahi tuna salad for lunch, large shrimp during the cocktail hour, and surf and turf for dinner with small lobsters caught locally.

Meanwhile, throughout the cruise, the nine-member crew is everywhere, offering freshly baked cookies, pouring drinks, pointing out constellations in the night sky, even swinging on a rope off the deck -- and encouraging passengers to join them.

But our first priority is the whales.

Sightings and swimming
On our first whale-watching expedition, Capt. Shawnda Gallup, 29, spots a whale blowing spray from its blowhole in the distance. "Whales off the port bow," she announces, and we all dash for the best viewing spots. Expedition Leader Kevin Martin identifies the huge blob in the water as a blue whale, a species larger than any dinosaur that ever lived.

We stare at the water, trying to second-guess where the whale will emerge. And it does surface, several times. But the blue whale doesn't breach or swim too close to our boat, so it's hard to get a good look. Eventually the wait between dives gets longer and longer, so our motor yacht cruises away. If the sea life isn't coming up to us, let's grab some snorkels and go down to it, Martin suggests.

When I hear that the water temperature is a cold 65 degrees, I bow out. However, five hardy couples rise to the challenge, put on wetsuits and board the motorized skiff that transports them to a reef near an island.

With the naturalist leading the way, the snorkelers see sea urchins, parrotfish and angel fish in the clear water. Gently, the naturalist places a puffer fish in the hands of Deborah Godward from England, who excitedly watches it balloon out into a round ball.

Another day, the same group of snorkelers opts to go swimming with juvenile sea lions near the rocky ledges of Los Islotes, which is home to a colony of sea lions. While we cheer their interaction from a dry skiff, the snorkelers emerge ecstatic from the experience.

"The sea lion looked right into my mask and dove all around me," Godward beams. "He even nudged me a bit."

Later Martin suggests kayaking to a beach known for its geodes and shells. I'm game. One couple overturns their kayak near the shoreline, soaking their digital camera, but the rest of us paddle safely and walk the rocky canyons, looking for the elusive geodes with crystal-filled cavities. A worried turkey vulture spots our group and spreads its wings to hide the delicious dead pelican that its mate is eating.

Adventures on land.
Each day's itinerary is dependent on the weather and the possible location of whales. We don't cruise at night except when northwesterly winds demand a change of our nighttime mooring location.

During the day, Captain Gallup keeps one eye on the weather charts and one eye out for whales. Although the crew spots a total of four whales during our weeklong cruise, they are too far away to see clearly, even with binoculars. But the 300 resident dolphins, which emerge one evening, leaping for joy in all directions, make us forget our disappointing whale count.

Still, lots of adventures await us. One morning, ranchero Alejo Romero meets us with 10 burros and mules at Bahia Agua Verde to lead us on a trail ride through the arroyos, cardon cactus forests and palm tree oasis of the Sierra La Giganta. Dressed in hand-tooled leather chaps and spurs, he proudly introduces us to his extended family, selling jewelry, and serenades us with a Mexican song along the way.

Another day, we drop anchor at the barren Isla Coyote, continuously occupied by the Cuevas family since 1914. Of the 244 islands in the Sea of Cortés, Isla Coyote is the only permanently inhabited settlement. Three brothers, descendants of the founder, live on the island with their families, fishing by day, then selling their catch in the city of La Paz.

We see salted fish drying on ropes and an impressive collection of whale bones, skulls and vertebrae, collected by an American couple whom the brothers befriended. In payment for our visit to peek into their thatched roof homes and memorial chapel, the crew of the Safari Quest leaves behind drums of water.

In search of "the friendlies" The remains of beached whales remind us we still have one more chance to see these mammoths of the sea. On the last day of our cruise, we board a bus that transports us across the peninsula to Bahia Magdalena on the Pacific Ocean. Here in the protected shallow inlets of several lagoons, the California gray whales arrive to breed and calve.

"Currently, there are 40 California gray females and calves in Bahia Magdalena," explains Judy Leighton, the local guide, "and they love to mingle with humans."

Leighton says a couple of fishermen discovered this unusual trait in 1972 when they saw a huge whale swimming toward their boat. They feared the whale would smash their panga with its powerful fluke, but instead the whale raised its head out of the water and began rubbing gently against the boat. "The gray whale was once called the devil fish," Leighton says, "but the species is known today as 'the friendlies."

Wearing life preservers, we board three pangas and zoom off in search of the friendlies. It doesn't take long before our driver-guides spot a mother and her calf swimming on the surface. All three boats slowly put-put alongside. The baby whale seems as excited to see us as we are to see it. It swims around and under our boats so closely that the drivers lift their engines out of the water to protect the baby from its blades. Every so often, the 45-foot mom swims by to check up on her 7-ton offspring, and, in time, prods the youngster to stop playing and start feeding.

This happens with three different sets of mothers and calves. The more we see of them, the braver we become. Now, when the whales swim by, we lower our hands into the water trying to attract their attention. Unfortunately, my panga is always at the wrong location, but Lynne Styles' panga is perfectly positioned.

As the baby whale swims by, she reaches down into the water and touches its fin. She's the only passenger from our motor yacht to successfully do so. "It's so soft!" she exclaims. "What a surprise."

My panga gets its own souvenir -- spray from the baby's blowhole. Wiping our faces and sunglasses, we all laugh until someone asks, "Is this whale snot?"

After a moment's hesitation, the laughter resumes. Whatever . . . our Safari Quest cruise and our successful search for whales has been unforgettable.

Ludmilla Alexander is a freelance travel writer from Saratoga, Calif., and frequent contributor to Travel. Reach her via travel@news.oregonian.com