Day 2 Diving on the Nautilus Xplorer.
I was personally afraid of the water being as cold as yesterday (52f!), but found that today was warmer and an absolutely awesome dive day.
The idea behind this trip is exploration, and so far ti has been what we have done.
Today in San Benito Island, we dove 2 parts of the ‘east’ part of this Island. Water was 61f around with blue water and amazing visibility.
Being a ‘ Caribean ‘ diver i’m used to good visibility and today was the day. We found harbor seals and California seals.
The dives went great. First dive depth around 60 feet and second dive a 40+- feet.
Amazing kelp forest on dive number two with lots and lots of fish and some other marine life (i was paying attention to the seals…)
The crew have been amazing and i always ask to my self, when do they sleep as they are always there at all times going and coming, keeping us super spoiled.
Day two for Diving aboard the NautilusXplorer has been awesome. Great crew, great people, great dives.
Jorge Tapia – Mexico
Ensenada hacia Islas de San Benito y Cedros .
Despues de un fabuloso tour en los vinedos de Santo Tomas salimos de Enesenada hacia Roca Ben (la ultima vez que la visitamos fue en 2004 ) se trata de un pinaculo muy cerca de isla San Martin. Roca Ben es maravilloso y con un habitat unico con aguas frias y surgencia profunda, la cobertura de invertebrados es espectacular con esponjas enormes, anemomonas, sargazo palma y muchos colores por todos lados. Hoy la visita anual a islas de San Benito con sus magnificos y pristinos bosques de kelp , muy buena visibilidad, abulones , langostas , una densidad de peces espectacular ademas de los lobos finos de Guadalupe, focas de puerto, lobos californianios y elefante marinos. Los bosques generan habitats marinos comparables con los bosques de tierra y en el libro Sea of Light de Richard Salas (que viene abordo en esta ocasion) se muestran muy buenas imagenes de ellos.
Estaremos en San Benito y Cedros en los proximos dias en algunos de los mejores lugares de buceo de todo el Pacifico de Mexico , fotos y videos en unos dias.
Roberto Pacifico Expediciones Mexico
Islas San Benito
Horn sharks and massive kelpforests. After been exploring Isla Cedros Yester day with not the best viz but a huge dense and deep kelp forest where the viz actually really cleared up at 90 ft , but with a temperature of 54 F about 12 C!!! The temperature has been all over much lower then we ever calculated with.. So we are back in San Benitos and making 3 dives. It felt a bit sad to leave San benito Cause the last day gave us a fantastic beautiful kelp dive not deep just around 40-25 ft but just so beautiful. Green eal grass on the bottom and Californian Sealion playing with us. Last dive we have found a rock that in one place you can find hornshark in almost every crack in the rock, beutiful purple hydro coral. and loads of fish. Really massive Sheep heads.
Surface condition: Calm seas. Mostly cloudy , temp 20 C
UW condition: Viz not so good for San Benito but still ca 10-15 m , No current and temp 60 F ca 15 C.
Water was warmer and visibility up to 25 meters. Good interactions with the Guadalupe fur seals. Nice pictures of the island and shark fin on the water !!! (…just attached to Jorge’s tank 🙂
Angel , Spain
From blue whales and dolphins to sharks and sea lions!
It is our first trip of the season and, after an admittedly frantic start, we have now settled in to our usual, exceptional pace. Yesterday we had the extreme pleasure of being met by a large group of blue whales. Larry, the engineer, will tell you there were hundreds of them… but in reality it was more like dozens. But when was the last time you saw dozens of huge blue whales?!?! Amazing. Then, after the whales said goodbye, a pod of dolphins came over to take advantage of the bow wave. They jumped and squealed for awhile, much to our delight, before they too, took off into the great, wide blue.
Today we dove with horn and leopard sharks in the morning, and sea lions in the afternoon. For the macro lovers, several different species of nudibrancs. The diversity of life out here is really something special!
After a delicious meal of kebabs, hummus and pita bread, we anchored for the night in a very calm, quiet bay of sorts. As I write this, there are sea lions playing in the dark off the stern of the boat. Do they ever sleep??
Our new hostess, (and my best friend!) Daniela, has joined us for her maiden voyage aboard the Nautilus Explorer. She has worked on many boats in the Caribbean and brings a great mix of fun, personality and professionalism to our crew. If you have the pleasure to meet her, she may regale you with stories of her parents escape from Chile, or perhaps sing you her favourite Jason Mraz song (if you ask nicely!). We are all very happy to have her on board!
Looking forward to the rest of our exploratory diving over the next few days. I wonder how many new underwater friends we can discover!
‘Till next time,
Hostesses Ashley and Daniela
Exploratory trips are always a challenge – scuba diving up and down the coast of Baja California – divemaster and guest blog
