San Ignacio Lagoon Weather

San Ignacio Lagoon Weather

March 03 thru 15, 2015

Guide Report-San Ignacio Lagoon

Beneath the Surface

By: Maria Teresa Solomons

People arrive here for an obvious purpose. Although they will insist they came purely with the hope of touching a whale another deeper desire begins to surface almost  immediately. I don’t have enough fingers on both hands to count the shared conversations, even before that hoped for cetacean contact, that express a self-reflection, a meditation, an Indian or Buddhist philosophy or a profound life story that is a miracle of serendipitous events; all personal visions to quietly want to change the world. I doubt that the Law of Attraction would have figured high on the list of essential reading for the likes of the NASA scientist or astrophysicist who were here, although for the artists and musicians perhaps, but  not at all for that black gold pipeline engineer, looking to retire as a conservation volunteer as a way to repair the contradiction of his lifetime. However, we are all forgiven for talking about the 50 shades of Gray we encounter on every journey…..

The lagoon is a quite place most of the time where there are minimal external distractions except for the wind.  Initially for the city arrivals  the aloneness of the salt flats might feel disconcerting because for the duration of the 4-day trip, they become a mere blip on their electronic connections, (even if Verizon sold them a roaming package for all occasions). There is something totally different about this environment. All systems are down, except for the natural ones. The catalyst is waiting to happen!

 Last week, amongst others,  the Orca network group, headed by ´Howwie´ Balcomb and his partner Susan have descended. If you didn’t know them better you might call them the ´tree huggers´ of the whale world but they are people completely involved with a passion for a cause that isn’t just about Orcas. They have all come here with a sublime expectation to draw from an effect, a memory, even enlightenment from this natural resource; contact with the Gray Whale in the lagoon they inhabit for the few sacred weeks that they are here. Actually whether they know it yet or not, this is the beginning of their new life, a second wind, an opportunity to reconfigure and log on again. Imagine how must it be to find yourself suddenly exposed to the silence of a significantly reduced external environmental with the major exception of the sound of the rhythm and depth of something powerful breathing in the open space around? No-one guarantees that something will happen but something always does.

Have you ever had to adopt  a particular orientation toward an experience? Have you ever come across the notion of stilling the mind? The words, ´Nature has a right to exist, persist, regenerate and evolve.´ come to my mind. (part of a statement in the Ecuadorian constitution drawn up in the late 1990´s because of a massive popular revolt against the decimation of their natural life source, the mangroves). We allow social dysfunction to dominate our lives most of the time and continue to live in conflict with ourselves as a result. Oscar Wilde phrased it perfectly. “We know the price of everything but the value of nothing.”

 The thought of exploring our own internal worlds, other than the world beneath the surface of the waves and its stream of graceful giants slowly moving  in a shallow haze of algae green, probably wasn’t originally on the cards, but the intensity of a glance from a baby Gray hypnotizes everyone.

What I sense in the individuals who arrive here is an unspoken desire for a bigger hope for themselves and something powerfully different for this world.

 So, for those who’ve been touched, after it all, what do you think?

 Did you come and call the whales or did you come because the whales had already called for you?

It's Not Just The Whales

More Than Just Whales

...at San Ignacio Lagoon

By: James Dorsey

While the whales are the main attraction at San Ignacio Lagoon, there is so much more to see and do when not on the water.

Many people do not realize that the lagoon is a self- contained eco-system, unique in the world, and home to countless creatures both big and small that most visitors walk right past and never see.

At low tide the coyotes hunt at the water line and if they are fortunate they might dig up a tasty eel for their evening dinner.  Baby octopus hide under rock ledges waiting for human fingers to find them and pull them out, and occasionally we even see the tiniest of newborn lobsters.

A few short steps from Campo Cortez we dig up fresh chocolate clams and scallops, eating them right out of the shell with a bit of fresh lime.

Shucking Scallops at Low Tide

This is life at campo Cortez, a place full of beautiful people in love with their home and the creatures they share it with.

And They are Great Raw

When you are there, stop to watch the sunset and realize you are surrounded by nature as it has always been intended

website, www.jamesdorsey.com

Guide Report - San Ignacio Lagoon

Full Moon Hype

By Liisa Juuti

“Grrrt! Grrrt!” I’m in the climax of my jungle adventure dream, crossing a river with a wounded animal in my arms, an indigenous boy by my side and we’re trying to head to the nearest village. A big bird appears from the jungle and we start following it.

“Grrrrt!” I wake up and realize there is a huge raven right outside my camper. It’s 5 a.m. I’m trying to get back to my adventure dream but the raven insists: “GRRRRRT!” So I give up and get up. “What is it?!”  I open the curtain to witness the most amazing, mesmerizing start to a sunrise that I’ve ever seen in my life. The oranges, purples and pinks accompany me into an exceptionally deep meditation. My morning meditations have become my ultimate refuge and source of energy and inner peace in this intense place.

The day starts apparently in an ordinary manner, but I feel strange, as if that raven wanted to prepare me for something. We have an unforgettable morning whale watching which simply cannot be described by words. All of a sudden we, the 10 strangers in the boat, have an experience so great and special to share that all we can do is smile and cry. No words come out, nor are needed. “Magic and goodness prevail”, I think.

At noon I hear Priscila, one of our ladies in the kitchen, running hysterically to the kitchen. She is crying in a way that immediately switches me into an intuitive survival mode. The raven and my meditation come to my mind as I run to her. Gisela, her 4 year old daughter is choking with a candy in her throat. I remember an image from my childhood, my mother with her hand literally inside my sister’s throat, pulling out the coin she’d just accidentally swallowed. M-T and I go through an emergency plan as we run to the camper area where the employees stay. Thank God no action was needed – Gisela was already fine. After about a half an hour of shiatsu and emotional support Priscila, Gisela’s mother, had calmed down, too.

On the second whale watch Shawna, our extremely funny joke cracking guest from Washington took care of entertaining us and the whales. She spends her days teaching Mexican teenager immigrants in Arizona. In the middle of laughing and singing everything from Christmas songs to the Sound of Music, Edelweiss and Happy Birthday, another guest accidently fell over her. I couldn’t first see the pain in her from all the laughter and singing, and it wasn’t until during happy hour that we noticed her totally swollen ankle. “Once it took me a week to notice my hip was broken!” she laughed with a hibiscus-margarita (that was her invention, by the way) in her hand and ice over her ankle.

I crashed into bed emotionally exhausted, thanking God for saving little Gisela’s life, for these amazing guests we get to attend every year, and for the whales bringing so much joy to our lives. No ravens around my camper. 

Weather Report-San Ignacio Lagoon

Recent Weather Update - San Ignacio Lagoon

February 20 thru March 02, 2015

San Ignacio Lagoon Guide Report

“El Panguero” –forecasting these conditions

By: Maria-Teresa Solomons March 3, 2015

A less traditional method for weather forecasting might warrant extending a wet index finger out to the elements to determine wind speed, direction and temperature including wind chill factor. However here, so you people in cyberspace have an idea about what´s happening weather wise so you chose your travel clothes wisely, this reality show demands we actually formally monitor all those effects the correct way with instrumentation, every day, three times a day.

Nevertheless, even that isn’t precise. The whale watching environment determines everything and being much the wiser for seasonal exposure, this is what actually happens….

When the sound of the ´palapa´ dining room door bangs open and closed thumping at the ineffective stone doorstop at regular intervals, or the wind whistles tryingly through that same tightly woven palm-leafed palapa roof late at night almost portending a blustery morning, the wind gauge at that point might measure at least 12 knots.

In the early morning warming their hands around their coffee mugs a small crowd musters for outside yoga just before sunrise. I´m there of course, to teach the class, unashamedly warming my fingers around my coffee mug thermos, wearing a black woolen balaclava and windbreaker, and about to jumpstart the day. Someone aptly labeled it “7-Layer Yoga”, as if it were a new trend. Bikram would shudder. I describe it simply as waking up to the wind and the breath. Despite lacking an external heat source we still heat up!

Cuco - Boat Captain

After we finish and a little after breakfast if it were finger to the air, it would probably read about 64 degrees Fahrenheit (or 8 degrees Celsius) on the precision instrumentation. An east wind is blowing about 6 mph and there´s not a single cloud as far as the horizon. Refugio, ´Cuco´, one of our ´pangueros´, is moving around the panga boats wearing a heavy waterproof jacket thick enough to survive the north Atlantic, his sunglasses reflecting water. Hmmm?!  As a ´Lagoon-ian, let’s say, everything indicates that he might know something we don’t.

Roberto - Boat Captain

I´ve learnt to follow his example by now and don a polar fleece over my orange Staff T-shirt and blur into the guests for a moment until I pull my own equally waterproof yellow storm weather jacket over my head and balaclava. I really stand out now, strikingly yellow on blue. By the time the groups have organized themselves and we are loading the pangas, I´m sweating again, this time in the sun. That fine red line of mercury could easily be reading a mean 78 degrees by now.

Heading Out - to see whales

I pull my balaclava up tight over my cap to cover my ears and neck. It’s a 10 minute ride over the flattening sea. The wind picks up as we gain speed and pass Punta Piedra to enter the “zone”. The boat spins in half a circle, drops speed and comes almost to a halt as the radio breaks the silence and Roberto, our ´panguero´, responds to a call that directs him to our first friendly whale of the day. The wind drops, it’s hot again and Roberto peels off his jacket and returns to layer one again.

Paco - Boat Captain

Leaning heavily over the side of the panga I dip my arms down as close to the water as I can reach and clap and, ´woop´ idyllically imagining that through its mystical green depths the resonance of those sounds might perhaps reach all 278 of the Gray whales that inhabit the lagoon at this point. When a huge mama whale approaches pushing her calf towards us she sends a circle of bubbles up as she exhales and the whole boat heaves with her movement. Her calf heaves itself over her back playfully and rolls one of its innocent eyes to scrutinize us and meets our wonder. Mama raises her head and makes a strange guttural hissing sound as she begins her blow.

Valentin - Boat Captain & Guide

I´m yellow above the blue now, leaning almost parallel to the water on the opposite side of the panga to where almost every other person is reaching down towards her. Every camera lens points in her direction as the stare from her single left eye penetrates curiously and deeply through us. I wonder what she can possibly feel being met with sunglass darkened smiles. On the downwind side of her whale breath her exhale baptizes us with a heavy rain. At that moment, as the residual droplets that have misted up the glass of all our lenses puts everyone momentarily on pause, the frontline cameras drop their guard.

Absurdly a thought about the right weather gear crosses my mind. A finger to the wind could never have forecast this encounter.

A Guide's View

Guide Report 

San Ignacio Lagoon, BCS, Mexico

Feb. 27, 2015

By:  Liisa Juuti

Our guests often ask me, "How come can you receive a new group just a few hours after the current group has left the camp?"  The answer is, planning & coordination, great team work and very high energy and stress level.  I’ll share with you how the “change of the group” day for each of us actually is. 

I.  Catalina, Ceci, Elsa and Pedro wake up at 4:20 a.m. and start preparing the packed lunch to be served on the plane, both for the group leaving the camp and for the new group. Usually this means preparing around 120 burritos. After that they start preparing the breakfast for our 25+ guests, serve it and wash the dishes.

II. Cuco wakes up at 5:30 am to help with the kitchen and then drives the guests in a bus to the airport, accompanies the group during the 2 hour flight to Ensenada, meets the new group in Ensenada, feeds both groups with the sandwiches prepared earlier on in the day, flies back from Ensenada to San Ignacio Lagoon with the new group and brings them on the bus to the camp in the early afternoon.

III. After the group has left the camp, our kitchen team starts cleaning up the 15 cabins and 3 tents one by one. Priscila washes by hand the 30+ sheets, pillow cases and aprons. After that follows the cleaning of bathrooms and showers, and once finished, the kitchen staff hurries up cleaning the fish or scallop for dinner. When the new group arrives around 4 p.m. the margaritas, chips and freshly made salsas are ready to be served.

IV. Meanwhile, Maldo drives for 2 hours leaving early in the morning for Santa Rosalia to buy all the food supplies for the new group.

V. M-T and I wake up at 6 am, get the palapa ready for breakfast, serve the breakfast to our guests and say goodbye to the group that leaves around 8 am. I make the cabin plan for the new group and check their special diets. Sometimes we have up to 19 guests with special diets in one group; my respects to the cooks´ imagination! Then we start cleaning up the palapa and separate the trash produced in 5 days. Thanks to our Eco Certificate we separate and recycle about 95% of all our trash with no need to deliver anything to the garbage dump. After having cleaned up and reorganized the lifejackets and rubber boots I do some office work; sales inventory, weather report, and send off the guide reports. If we have time, we wash our laundry and clean up the camper we´re staying in. Then at 1 pm we put our special staff shirts on and head to the airport to receive the new group with drinks, snacks and a big smile, and there's nothing fake about that smile. We love this! 

Census Update - San Ignacio Lagoon

Census Report From San Ignacio Lagoon

February 27, 2015

Gray Whale Calves:  119
Gray Whale Adults:  158

Total Gray Whales:  277

Guide Report-San Ignacio Lagoon

San Ignacio Lagoon - Guide Report

Feb. 22, 2015
by Maria-Teresa Solomons

Thoughts that stir: the start of a day at the lagoon

The mudflats glisten in the low morning light as I turn over at the alarm to reset it for the 3^rd time perhaps. It first sounds at 5.40am when it is still dark but those few precious extra minutes before the sun touches the horizon, lingering between half sleep and half awake, are the luxury I choose to meet the dawn in my own time.

I inhale and exhale slowly for a minute or two to calm my pulse and hold my breath, and from my top bunk camper window, watch the changing colors outside, a beautiful contrast of clouds and reflections. Another couple of minutes pass by and I repeat the process again, each time extending the breath-hold a little more observing the thoughts that cross my mind.

I´m a freediver as well as one of the camp guides here and each day as we all revel in clearly the most intimate contact with an animal you are ever likely to have, I´m reminded of each other life altering experience, of every privileged encounter I have had underwater on my own, dancing amongst giants.

Although as part of the marine mammal protection act in this reserve as well as in Scammons Lagoon and Magdalena Bay, it´s forbidden to dive with the Gray whales, and even then only a very small section of the lagoon is within limits for whale-watching. In order to enter the area each guest receives a paper bracelet for each day that they enter the reserve, from the Secretary for Marine Resources and Natural Protected Areas (SEMARNAT), which is included as part of the Camp Cortez fee. In addition to this the San Ignacio community itself has instigated its own system of monitoring for who comes in and out of the area, and how many boats there can be at any one time. It´s perfect.

Being a guide here is perhaps an Overture to the song of the humpbacks I´ve felt resonate through me at different depths, or the resident Whale sharks I dive alongside in the Sea of Cortez, where I´ve spent many other seasons.

 San Ignacio Lagoon is beyond a doubt the best place in the world for this close an encounter with the Gray Whale. There are almost no worlds that can even begin to express the indescribably sublime feeling that comes with the realisation that both mother and baby have chosen to turn towards the boat.

Holding my breath I remember how yesterday, she heaved her baby up to the extended arms and how I watched the escalating excitement of everyone out there, including the boat alongside waiting its turn. A touch, or more, a caress, is as breathtaking as the unexpected warmth of its spongy rubbery skin.

An alarm sounds again.  Time out is over.  Another full day scheduled ahead!

Guide Report-San Ignacio Lagoon

Game for an adventure! Donna´s 81^st year

 By Maria-Teresa Solomons

Most visitors arrive at the Laguna San Ignacio by plane which lands on an isolated desert airstrip, about an hour from the Baja Ecotours camp on the “Burro” (donkey), a converted 70´s American school bus. The bus formerly named, the “cheese bus” by its kid riders,   probably saw its hay-day about 20yrs ago and equally as probably never even imagined the tour of duty it was heading for.

Now Johnny Friday, another name somewhat reminiscent of being lost on another type of desert island, has declared, says, Liisa Juuti, our Finnish head Whale-watching guide, that there will be a newer bus for next year!  Johnny is one of the co-owners of the camp who arrived here in the mid 80´s and saw the potential of all that the lagoon had to offer. What he recognized then has probably not changed much. When our octogenarian visitor, Donna, stepped off the plane last week she would have been another reflection of the quintessential memory of a community which continues to be bathed in an aura of another century.

The Laguna San Ignacio Gray Whale Sanctuary sits on the Pacific side of the 6 million acre (2.5 million hectare), Vizcaino Biosphere reserve, the largest in Mexico, along an almost uninhabited desert coast where it´s estimated about 50% of the Gray Whales arrive between February and March to breed and give birth before returning north to their feeding grounds around 5000 kms away.

For this grand lady to have left her remote southern Californian ranch to come all the way out here must mean that this desert place must hold something special and being as vibrant as she is, Donna was game for all the adventure that this experience is.

Gray Whale Census San Ignacio Lagoon

Census Report

San Ignacio Lagoon

February 20, 2015

Gray Whale Calves:  151
Gray Whale Adults:  196

Total Gray Whales:  347

Guide Report For San Ignacio Lagoon

Guide Report - Gray Whales

San Ignacio Lagoon, BCS, Mexico

By:  Liisa Juuti

February 19, 2015

Besides the daily interaction with the whales and the breathtaking beauty and simplicity of the lagoon, I love the exchange of knowledge and experiences with our guests and guides. Never had I thought that San Ignacio Lagoon was the place I’d learn the steps for Electric Slide (that’s line dance, of course!). Thank you Nancy & Spencer for sharing with us your passion! M-T, one of our guides, has been giving very welcoming yoga / stretching sessions to our guests and sharing her experience of free diving and whale sharks.

We learned a lot from Carrie Newall, too.  Carrie is a marine biology teacher and has been doing gray whale research for almost 20 years. She brings her group of whale enthusiastics and volunteers to our camp every year. She has her whale watching company in Oregon and specializes in identifying the summer resident grays along the Oregon coast. It was in the 60s and 70s that researchers observed that a few gray whales were spending their summers along the coasts of Oregon, California, Washington and British Colombia, instead of migrating to the lagoons of Baja California. At the moment there are about 200 resident whales, of which Carrie has identified about 75 individuals.

How to identify these whales, then? Don’t they all look gray with barnacles in their head? There are various factors that the whale biologists use to identify individuals. The dorsal hump region is a good spot for identifying since it’s always seen when a gray whale surfaces, and as each dorsal hump is as unique as a fingerprint. Grays can also have scars in their bodies - both man-made (caused by a harpoon or boat propeller) or by killer whale attacks - that serve as a way of identifying them. They can have “birth marks”: prominent color patterns such as white spots, horizontal lines or differences in tones. They might have scars caused by barnacles (when a barnacle attaches to the skin, it permanently depigments the skin leaving a unique white barnacle scar). There are also differences in the color of gray whales; some are significantly darker, others lighter than average. Also the fluke can be very different color from one individual to another.  

During their stay at our camp Carrie was quite sure of having spotted a whale called Beacon in the lagoon. It was first identified off Depoe Bay in 2007. It was named Beacon because of the round white spot on the right dorsal hump. Our boat drivers confirmed the visit from Beacon in the lagoon. 

Guide Report-San Ignacio Lagoon

Campo Cortez Update

Laguna San Ignacio

February 19, 2015

We have celebrated a few birthdays this week....and Maldo our camp host, also does the baking...

Roberto takes Kayaks out to the beach for a kayak excursion this week. 

San Ignacio Lagoon Weather Reports

Daily Weather Reports From San Ignacio Lagoon

Dates from February Thru April, 2015

Guide Report - San Ignacio Lagoon

San Ignacio Lagoon Guide Report

Gray Whales at San Ignacio Lagoon

Feb 11-15

by Stephan Kolditz

Our first trips were once again very successful. We were lucky enough to witness the show of a juvenile gray whale breaching twenty times in a row, quite close to the pangas ! The grays were not the only residents of the lagoon we got a chance to see : every day, we spotted some California sea lions, bottlenose dolphins, common loons or brandt’s geese.
The baby gray whales are progressively getting used to our presence and on some occasions their moms allow them to play with us. Almost all our guests if not all of them got the possibility to pet a baby or an adult. 
On the last day, the weather forecast announced a thunderstorm, but fortunately we were able to go out at sea without getting wet by the pouring rain that started to fall during the night.

Freddie And The Whales

San Ignacio Lagoon Guide Report

Group 2 : Report 15^th  

by: Maria-Teresa Solomons

Freddie and the Whales

If you´ve never seen a real whale close-up before, like Freddie, you might have become as excited as he did as, on our fourth trip, a curious baby Gray whale weighing no more than about 1.5 tons and spanning about a third of the length of the 23ft ´panga´ skiff, (small as far as whale babies are concerned), returned time after time for a petting, its patient mother in escort. Freddie´s small frame paled in comparison as he leaned over the side of the boat. 

Freddie and his sister, Alice had come all the way from England with their parents to experience this one moment as we all had.

It´s still early in the season to have expected this close an encounter as most of the adult Grays are on the last leg of their 7,000 mile southward migration to the lagoons of southern Baja California and are usually more concerned with courtship than our skiffs. Although not social mammals characteristically except when mating, throughout the week we were surrounded by curious spy hopping individuals, graceful displays of whale-tales and often up to 5 adults traveling single-mindedly through the lagoon on every whale-watching excursion, the numbers sighted having increased from 224 in the first week of February to 286 by the second week.

For Freddie the day started quietly only on the boat he wasn’t quiet at all. His playful calling prodded on by his quite delicate little sister´s, escalated to high frequency squeals when, close by burst the distinct sigh of two approaching whales and Paco, our panga driver turned to face them… The heart-shaped mist of the mother returning to surface sprayed over us and everyone began to shout “Splash! Splash!”

We made so much noise that another boat came by to watch as we rocked from side to side as the mother and calf dipped and dove under and around us for the next 40 minutes until with a chorus of exalted laughs, Freddie reached out and touched the calf. He threw his arms into the air with clenched fists and yelled, “”YESSSSSS!, with more satisfaction than having scored a goal.

The day couldn’t have been more thrilling when adults become children again. The silent watchers on other boats probably wondered what magic we had onboard that allowed us this close encounter. I swear it was us children laughing!