San Ignacio Gray Whales
Extraordinary Interaction & Experience
Unfortunately, the wind was being a little uncooperative today, and ash from the volcanic island was blowing into the water column, hampering visibility a fair bit. Nevertheless, there were some silvertip shark sightings, and the first day went by smoothly. Also, this trip coincided with a full moon, with a lunar eclipse due in a few days, the nights are beautiful.
Read MoreAt the end of the day, just before coming up from the last dive for fresh baked cookies and champagne mimosas, some of our divers were bid farewell by a large school of hammerhead sharks! Once again, the creatures of Revillagigedos had organized a really nice sendoff for us, practically begging us to return to say hi to them one more time.
Read MoreAlmost immediately we were mobbed by an enormous school of yellowfin tuna swimming powerfully all around us, with silky and silvertip sharks thrown in the mix. After they passed, a group of hammerhead sharks made an appearance, allowing some excellent photographing opportunites. As we approached the island, a cloud of triggerfish burst into view, with circling silvertip sharks deep below us. The island drew by quickly in the current, and as we passed to the south we were given one last sendoff by yellowfin tuna and some curious wahoo, with some coy passes by hammerhead sharks for an encore.
Read MoreTo our great fortune, we were greeted almost immediately by a pair of chevron giant manta rays! They stayed with us the entire day, waiting patiently under the Nautilus until we re-entered the water, and graced us with some intimate interaction and eye-to-eye contact. The mantas may have dominated the centre stage at The Canyon, but that’s not to say that other pelagic animals didn’t get their time in the limelight, as we were also treated to a couple of close passes by a school of hammerhead sharks, and had some excellent sightings of a small group of silvertip sharks.
Read MoreThen off to Socorro to check in with the Mexican navy and dive Punta Tosca with the manta, tiger and hammerhead sharks on dive day 2 followed by Cabo Pearce on dive day 3. Our first dive at Cabo Pearce had great visibility and almost no current. It was a relaxing dive with a few sightings of dolphins and sharks off the outer point along with a group of Barberfish patiently waiting for something to clean. At times they even moved over to the scuba divers to see if they needed a clean.
Read MoreThe upside of this cooling is that the larger oceanic sharks start appearing. We saw a group of 6 silvertip sharks and 4 galapagos sharks patrolling “fish alley” where the large schools of jacks and bonitos hang out. There seems to be a hierarchy in the shark world whereby silkys are displaced by galapagos which in turn are displaced by silvertips.
Read MoreOn the trip out to the last dive guests were treated to the sight of a manta feeding on the surface at the dive site. We observed two separate incidents of interesting shark behaviour during the day.
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