NGL N24.21.857 W110.0.749 clear sky, wind S5, swell S1ft, air temp 32, water temp 22C, visibility 5-7meters
Good morning, everybody. NGL is cruising in the north of the Cerralvo channel. Guests are snorkeling at La Reinita and Lauren and Steve are scuba diving there.
This morning was very calm animal-wise, probably related to a meteorological phenomenon that does not happen very often here: a thick fog (with less than 30 meters visibility) was pushed in the channel from the southeast and completely engulfed the channel and the whole east side of the island. I had seen that fog before but it would disappear when heated by the sun and approaching land. Instead, this thick fog lasted until 1300 when the west wind started to blow.
We started the day with a school of mobulas, but guests did not wish to enter the water as the mobulas were a few feet below the water’s surface. The school looked big from the surface and was confirmed later by the airplane. We moved to a pod of bottlenose dolphins, about 30 of them. Half of the guests got a glimpse of the dolphins underwater and as they were busy fishing, they were not curious at all towards the snorkelers. They did a few good jumps in the wake of the NGL, but quickly lost interest and went back to fishing.
We decided to head north towards La Reina for a dive at 1200, but about 3nm away from the rock, the fog that was still on the east side of Cerralvo completely engulfed the rock and the pangas that were there. We turned around and decided to go to La Reinita. When we were about to drop the divers, a local panga with 6 spear fishers was there and insisted that we wait 30 min before diving. Guests were finally in the water at 1300.
Yesterday afternoon we had a great time snorkeling with thousands of mobulas in front of El Saltito. Water was a bit choppy due to the southern wind and some guests were reluctant to jump in, expecting bad visibility. Fortunately, they changed their mind as there were thousands of mobulas close to the surface and swimming slowly right in front of them. It was a great end to the day.
