Cape Region, Baja California Sur

Finsterra is where we saw today’s first light. This place is also known as Land’s End or the Friar’s Rocks in Cabo San Lucas. Now a tourist Mecca, Cabo San Lucas used to be a pacific and quiet fishing town. The National Geographic Sea Bird made a brief stop to take a look at the magnificent granitic arches with the morning light. As we left, a breaching humpback whale calf was seen. It played on the surface for a few minutes until its mom broke the surface of the water and both of them dove into the deep.

We spent the morning in the town of San Jose del Cabo. Here some of us explored the town and others went bird watching at the only fresh water estuary on the Southern part of the peninsula. As some birds migrate over the peninsula on their way to mainland Mexico, they stop on last time here at the estuary before moving on. Blue winged teals, ruddy ducks and pied billed grebes were seen. We also looked for more unusual and special birds that cannot be seen anywhere else in the world but here. The Belding’s yellowthroat was our most exciting sighting. These elusive and shy birds are endemic to the cape region and good looks at them are rare.

We continued our way to the Gulf of California. As we sailed around the tip of the peninsula, we maneuvered the ship several times to see more humpback whales. We saw several more mothers with their calves and a few competitive groups of courting adults. On a couple occasions one of the calves surfaced very close to us. Several breaches were seen from both the youngsters and the adults.