Travels with The Rayman

Yessireeeee.  We spent our Monday morning counting sperm.  Whales that is.  As luck would have it our ship sailed right into a group of sperm whales, mothers and daughters.  The way the crew knew they were sperms as opposed to grays, or humpbacks, was that their spray Isn’t as high and their blow holes are located on the left side of their head.  An interesting adaptation that just about no other animal has employed in its’ evolution.  It is an asymmetrical thing.

Sperm whales also spend quite a bit of time doing “short dives”, one right after the other until they at last take in a big breath and descend to the ocean floor and then hang out in the deep for up to an hour.  

They are enormous.  And they have teeth.  No one went swimming this a.m.

We are now getting ready to get on the zodiacs again to ride over to Banana Beach on Isla San Jose.  It is a bright white banana shaped affair.  Looking forward to two hours off the ship.  Plan to walk the beach and stretch our legs.  When we return one of the naturalists will give a talk on cacti.  

Back to yesterday for a minute.  Yesterday we rested all morning on the ship declining invitations to hike or snorkel.  The afternoon, we went ashore on an Isla and Rayman and myself had the good fortune to be the only ones to take a walk with a naturalist for a photo session.  Don’t know how we were so lucky.  The other photo class had 30 attendees.  Lucky us.  It took a trip to the Sea of Cortes to learn how to use features on my iPhone.  Expensive lesson.  Rayman even got into it and took some good pics.  We may take a photo class at some point.  Great fun.   Here are a few of our shots.

Cardon cactus up close

Shell on sand

Geology

There are people on board that have lens about the size of Gilbralter.   One fellow remarked that he didn’t need to go to the gym.  Foisting the telephoto lens was quite enough for him.  Can’t wait to see the slide show at the end.  With all this equipment there is bound to be some spectacular photos.  

When we returned from the Isla, I looked like a drown rat.  Was placed on the front of the zodiac and got sprayed constantly as the afternoon winds had kicked up.  Hoping to avoid that this p.m.  After dinner, we were treated to a presentation of Mexico, it’s people, it’s food.  Very interesting because  it was delivered by a Mexican citizen who also happened to be a naturalist.  He even ate a stink bug once.  Didn’t like it.  Took three days to get the taste out of his mouth.  He liked grasshoppers though.   I think I could eat a grasshopper.  Next trip to Mexico, perhaps.

Guess I’ll go don my life vest now.  

One point.  We haven’t been lost.  We haven’t gotten into any trouble and for that I apologize because when everything goes well, the stories are a bit boring.