Saturn and Mars gleamed golden and rusty red beside the moon as early risers gathered on the stern in readiness for a pre-sunrise landing on Isla San Estéban. Our goal was to photograph the sunrise with a foreground of cardon cacti and the distant ship. After landing, a short and gentle climb led to a terrace where there was plenty of room for tripods with an expansive vista below. Sunlight painted the clouds near the horizon with a blaze of fiery color, and warm dawn light played across the mountains and stands of cacti. It was well worth all the effort of getting up at such an unreasonable hour. The early group joined those still on the ship for breakfast, and soon after, we journeyed to shore for a variety of walks up a broad arroyo. One of the day’s quests was to find two species of large lizards, the San Estéban pinto chuckwalla, a fat blotchy creature, and the sleeker spiny-tailed iguana, a handsome gray-and-black reptile. Each hiking party experienced different sightings, but luckily we located both lizards, warming in the sun or munching on cardon flowers high above us.
The ship relocated to Isla San Pedro Mártir for the afternoon. We cruised along the shoreline of this isolated island with our inflatable boats to see the brightly colored geologic formations, abundant seabirds, and marine mammals. Rafts of hundreds of eared grebes dove in unison and then reappeared almost simultaneously. A rat eradication effort seems to have resulted in increasing numbers of red-billed tropicbirds each year. Many of these elegant birds with long, streamer tails flew over our boats along with blue-footed and brown boobies. Curious young sea lions porpoised beside some of our boats. A real thrill for those in several boats was a water-level view of bottlenose dolphins bow-riding and leaping in wild jumps as we motored along with them.
As we traveled south for new adventures, whale spouts appeared ahead. It was a new species for our voyage, Bryde’s whale! We zeroed in on one animal to see its large upright dorsal fin and dark back. Dusk settled in as the sun sank and the day came to a close with a very convincing green flash.
