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2024 Baja Whalewatching Tour (Feb 15-26) Laguna San Ignacio

February 18

Dear whale watchers:
We arrived to the entrance at Laguna San Ignacio around 0830 this morning. There was a pretty good swell but the Jesus from our friends and colleagues at Kuyima met us at the entrance and showed us the way in. We got our anchor down near Rocky Point at about 1030 and got the whale watchers out in the pangas (locals’ skiffs) right away.
There are lots of whales around, more than 100, here right now and it looks like more are on the way. There’s plenty to look at and a few friendly whales visited as well.
It’s been an awesome day with awesome weather. We’re camping out tonight and going to do it again tomorrow.
Captain Mike and the boys
2024-02-19T17:08:00-08:00February 19th, 2024|Trip Reports, Uncategorized|
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2024 Baja Whalewatching Tour (Feb 15-26) Islas San Benito

February 17

Dear whalewatchers:
We had a nice day at Isla San Benito. The elephant seal population, as well as the fur seal population, on the island seem to be quite healthy. Excellent birding as well.
After leaving the island, we spent time with a few single humpback whales. We’re headed for Laguna San Ignacio now.
Captain Mike and the boys
2024-02-19T06:50:30-08:00February 19th, 2024|Trip Reports, Uncategorized|
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2024 Baja Whalewatching Tour (Feb 15-26) Ensenada and southbound

February 16

Dear whalewatchers:
We departed last night on our first Baja adventure of the year. We cleared customs and immigration check in Ensenada around 0730 am and made a left turn for Islas San Benito.
Just south of Punta Banda on the Banda Bank, there was a lot of life around. We had gray whales, common dolphin and Pacific white-sided dolphin. Along with gulls, shearwaters, pelicans and cormorants. Later in the day, the action decreased though we did see a few distant albatross and late in the afternoon we had a red-billed tropicbird fly overhead.   We’ll be at San Benitos first thing in the morning.
Captain Mike and the boys
2024-02-17T06:46:09-08:00February 17th, 2024|Trip Reports, Uncategorized|
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2023 Pelagic Birding Tour (Sep 4-8) day 3

September 6

Dear birders:

Today’s highlights were 10 tropicbirds, Nazca booby, and Guadalupe murrelets, along with albatross, terns and jaegers. More as we can get reports together!
Thanks to Alisa Schulman-Janiger for the 2022 photo of Guadalupe murrelet.

Captain Mike and Team Searcher

2023-09-07T08:46:14-07:00September 7th, 2023|Uncategorized|
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2023 Pelagic Birding Tour (Sep 4-8) day 2

September 5

Dear birders:

We’re drifting at the boobie colony at Santa Barbara island this morning in beautiful weather. We’ve sighted four species of boobies: Blue footed, Nazca, Brown and Red-footed Boobies.  And we also re-sighted a brown/blue hybrid.
We left there to head west towards San Miguel Island. Throughout the day, we saw plenty of murrelets, a few Cassin’s auklets, albatross, and more terns and petrels. Also the fan favorite, Red-billed tropicbirds!

The attached photos were taken on the 2022 tour by Alisa Schulman-Janiger, including the common dolphins.

Captain Mike and Team Searcher

Nazca booby

2023-09-06T06:53:13-07:00September 6th, 2023|Uncategorized|
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2023 Pelagic Birding Tour (Sep 4-8)

September 4

Dear birders:

We departed on our annual Labor Day 5-day trip to search the offshore and deep water areas of Southern California. Early reports from the 9-mile Bank and 30-mile Bank included these sightings: Black and Leach’s storm petrels, Northern fulmar, Pink-footed, Sooty and Black-vented shearwaters, Red and Red-necked phalaropes, Common, Elegant, Royal, and Caspian terns, Long-beaked and Short-beaked common dolphins, all in really nice weather.

The attached photos were taken on the 2022 tour by Alisa Schulman-Janiger, including the common dolphins.

Captain Mike and Team Searcher

Northern fulmar

2023-09-05T11:53:42-07:00September 5th, 2023|Uncategorized|
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Dining with Mobulas

These Mobulas are dining in the light of the Searcher. It was a wonderful nighttime visit from a school of mobula rays on a recent tour to Baja’s Sea of Cortez. These rays are known for their extreme jumping and breaching abilities, but this time they were slowly swimming and feeding on plankton attracted to our boat lights.

Mobula rays resemble manta rays and are in fact related. They are called flying rays, devil rays, or just mobulas. They feed by scooping prey into their mouths with the lobes on either side of their heads. So a feast was happening in this video!

 

 

2020-07-15T16:34:08-07:00February 25th, 2020|Uncategorized, Videos|
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Tour #4 (Mar 9-20, 2018) – Isla San Jose

Hello whalewatchers,

Last night we had a trememdous journey north as we encountered with miles and miles of bioluminescence! There were schools of fish that appeared as a big balls of light and other fish that made for a great show for those that stayed up late to enjoy it.
We enjoyed a spectacular sunrise at Punta Colorado on Isla San Jose this morning. We started the day early with a wake-up call for everyone to see this event.

Then passengers went ashore for a desert arroyo walk and then a snorkel session for those interested. It was a busy morning! We are headed offshore this afternoon looking for whales.

Capt Art and Team Searcher

Hello whalewatchers,

We had a good visit at Punta Colorado this morning! We travelled north in the San Jose channel looking for whales and wildlife. We had good looks at black and least storm petrels.

We did come across two adult gray whales heading south close to the peninsula. We have seen gray whales in the Sea of Cortez before but can’t recall seeing them this far north. Here’s the position 25.32″ north and 111.00 West. About 50 miles east of the town of Loreto. A rare sighting for us.

There was also an awesome sunset over the peninsula this evening.
Capt Art and Team Searcher

2018-03-19T06:11:28-07:00March 19th, 2018|Uncategorized|
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