National Geographic Sea Lion turned back to the protected waters of Magdalena Bay today after encountering some rocky seas en route to Laguna San Ignacio. Luckily, our guests understand that this sometimes happens on an expedition! They greeted the sunshine and calm waters with open arms, ready to take on the day. Some of us celebrated the morning with a stretch class before filling our bellies with breakfast!
After breakfast we loaded up the expedition landing crafts for some time on shore at Punta Belcher. While we were loading, we were greeted to the sight of a large group of pelagic red crabs swimming close to the surface and on all sides of the ship. Once we were ashore, we discovered a shoreline riddled with hundreds of those same red crabs who were dead and had washed up on the beach. Dead stuff on the beach doesn’t mind if you get up close and personal so we got some intimate looks at the crabs we had just been watching in action. Seeing the variety of things washed up on the beach gave us an indication of the abundance of the marine ecosystem where we are traveling. We saw various kinds of shells and crabs as well as fishes and turtles and several species of sharks. We also saw large flocks of gulls on shore as well as magnificent frigate birds, brown pelicans and an osprey.
The afternoon found us out on deck looking for wildlife and enjoying our surroundings. Gretchen Pederson gave a talk about sea birds and Rikki Swenson gave us an introduction to digital photography. While all of us were going about our day, our Expedition Leader, Jack Swenson, was pulling strings and greasing wheels and grinding gears organizing a “Plan B” to get us up to see those gray whales in Laguna San Ignacio. Luckily, our fearless leader was successful and now we will have a cross-peninsula land excursion to look forward to!
