Guide Report Week of: Mar. 04 thru 08

Guide Report: March 04 thru 08

San Ignacio Lagoon

Hola

Weather: Highs in the mid 50's to upper 70's

               Lows in the mid 30's to upper 40's

Winds between 7mph to 40 mph

    This group had an excellent start off as well. They had three beautiful days playing with friendly moms and calves. Some guest had the opportunity to touch the baleen and even see the tongue of a baby! When a whale is friendly and next to the boat we encourage the viewers to reach out their hands for a scratch on the mouth. This strategy often ends with the friendly mouth opening up with a huge smile. Then you can reach in and touch the baleen while dragging your hand gently across the jawline. Sometimes a hitchhiker (sea lice) will attach itself to your finger. If that's the case, it does NOT hurt but we'd like to keep the lice as a sample to bring back to our camp for a closer observation under the lighted microscope.

  We had five researchers from NOAA join us at the camp. They wanted to  place satellite tags on twenty of the gray whales before the whales start the journey up north back to Alaska. The researchers were able to accomplish this in two full days of work. The tags will hopefully stay on for a full migration but often will fall off in a matter of a month. You can follow the tracking at this website

http://swfsc.noaa.gov/PRD-GrayWhale-tracking/  

……May the whales have a safe journey up north!

Guide Report: Week of Feb. 29 - Mar. 04

Guide Report: February 29 thru March 04

San Ignacio Lagoon

Hola!

Week of 29th of Feb and 4th of March

Weather: Highs from mid 50's to upper 70's

               Lows in the 30's to upper 40's

    Where do I start..........? This group had the best first day of whale watching that I have ever seen. We had a beautiful morning cruise in the ponga to the observation area and found some splashing about off on the horizon. It was three whales involved in a mating ritual. We observed a couple of other males and another female moved in on the action as well. Spring has been sprung! We moved on to find an extremely happy mother and calve nearby. We played for the rest of the whale watching segment with them as the whales would gently glide from one side of the boat to another. They gave everyone an equal amount of time to pet and scratch as they would spyhop next to the boat and submerge back down. When the time was up for our segment of fun with the whales we returned back to the camp. As all the guest filled into the dinning hall, there was an eruption of excitement as they told each other there experience with the mighty "devilfish."

Guide Report

Guide Report Mar. 8 thru 9, 2012
by Maria Aguilar Murillo

Espanol:

Semana de 08-09 de marzo

Después de un día de mucho viento vino la calma, tuvimos un grupo pequeño, pero igual disfrutaron de todas las actividades que pudimos brindar. El primer día llegando al área de observación ballenas, en vez de ballenas nos encontramos con varios delfines que querían jugar con la embarcación. Después de un rato los clientes tuvieron la oportunidad también de disfrutar de un bebe ballena que quiso jugar con nosotros y no solo el primer día. Hubo la oportunidad de caminar en la bajamar, ver los pulpos. Y una caminata al “museo” para ver algunos huesos de ballenas, delfines, aves, tortugas y demás que podemos encontrar ahí a la orilla del mar. Y por supuesto disfrutaron de unas ricas tortillas de harina recién hechas y por sus propias manos.

English:

Week of March 08-09
After a windy day came the calm, we had a small group, but equally enjoyed all the activities that we offer. The first day arriving at the area of watching whales, instead of whales we have several dolphins who wanted to play with the boat. After a while guests had the opportunity to also enjoy a baby whale that wanted to play with us and not just the first day. There was the opportunity to walk at low tide, see octopuses. And a walk to the "Museum" to see some bones of whales, dolphins, birds, turtles and others that can be found there at the edge of the sea. And of course they enjoyed a few rich freshly made flour tortillas and by their own hands.

Guide Report Feb. 25-29

Hola!

 Week of Feb. 25 - 29, 2012

Weather: Highs in the mid 50's and upper 60's

               Lows in the 30's and lower 40's

    This group had some extreme whale watching days where winds reached at times around 26 mph while we were in the observation area. We all still had a great time playing with the whales. I had the chance to introduce this group to a male whale with the name of "Barni" short for barnacle. Barni had only acorn barnacles on his left side of his face. We joked that he must have been and left side eater. In which, maybe he would only feed on the left and pick up the

hitchhikers along the way. Barni is always happy to play with us. He must be around the age from four to six. He still has time to always play with our boats, which most males do not. Sometimes pacing back and forth to make sure everyone has a chance to touch :) We first met barni a couple trips ago and has been a great friend to have around. Even when the swells were building and most whales were only spy-hopping. He still came over to play!!! We had a great time sharing a whale of a tale with each other. Enclosed is a picture of Barni with

no barnacles on his right side of his face and whale we had named "Bam-bam." Since this calf could not control itself in the strong winds and current  it would collide with the side of the ponga from time to time. Another awesome group to have around :) We star gazed with the planets Jupiter, Venus and Mars sharing the sky with the crescent moon. The constellations out here are fantastic! They are at times crystal clear!

All the best,

Christopher Match

Guide Report: Feb. 21-25

Week of 21st to 25th of Feb

Weather: Highs in mid 50's to upper 70's

                Lows in mid 30's to upper 40's

   This was the first time that I've viewed whales mating in the observation area with still having a chance to play with a mother and calf!! Usually all the mothers and calves are far away working on swimming lessons and controlled movements of the flukes (tails). This group really lucked out!! We had plenty of friendlies to play with on this trip. We watched nursing take place while the bottlenose dolphin circled around trying to get a sweet taste of the mother's milk. We had fantastic weather with barely a breeze on the laguna at times (which never really happens this time of the year). With this, we really had to monitor our power usage since our dinning hall/living room and kitchen are all ran off of the wind turbines. However, all of our guest cabins remained at full charge with there personal battery and inverter attached with a solar panel. :) We had enough water to go kayaking around the outer rim of the mangroves, while observing the

amazing bird life and sting rays circling around.--A great trip and time had by all!

All the best,

Christopher

Guide Report: Week of Feb. 25-29

Guide Report: Feb. 25 – 29

By:  Maria Agular Murillo

Spanish:

En la semana del 25 al 29,  Los turistas tuvieron a oportunidad de tocar y besar las ballenas. tuvimos tambien la oportunidad de mostrarles como sacan el callo de hacha, nos acercamos a una de las embarcaciones de los pescadores, nos regalo unas hachasy los mas valientes se atrevieron a probarlos crudos y conocerlos vivos.

English:

During the week of February 25 to 29, our guests had to opportunity to touch and kiss the whales. We also had the opportunity to show them how the local fishermen extract the “callo de hacha” (a type of scallop). There was a local fishing boat near the camp fishing the “callos” and they gave to us a “callo” and a few of our valiant guests tried them raw to know how they tasted. 

February 4-9 trip drive/fly trip

GUIDE REPORT 

FEB.4-9 BUS - AIR TRIP

Week of Feb. 4^th – 9^th

Bus-Fly Trip

Report by:  James Dorsey

www.jamesdorsey.com

After 15 years in the lagoon, I still consider it an honor and privilege to work in one of God's paintings every day.  As a guide and naturalist it is a gift to be able to help educate and enlighten people about these wonderful giants whose domain we enter with their blessing.

We saw a lot of mating action and the "Pink Floyd' made its debut a couple times.  The mothers were still a little skittish about bringing baby up to the boat but everyone made contact and had a great time.  The camp had recently received its certification for being "Green" from the Mexican government and everyone was quite proud of this. As always, Catalina and Olga fed everyone like kings, and Maldo kept everyone smiling with his one of a kind personality.  All prejudice aside, I love working in this camp!

If I get two or three "Keeper photos" out of a trip I consider myself fortunate and this time we were returning late in the afternoon while the tide was out.  We had to "Rooster tail" the boats through shallow water and spotted a couple coyotes hunting near shore.  Suddenly there was a silver flash and I had a split second to get the shot of the coyote hauling an eel out of the sand.  This was a first for me and next season cannot come too soon.