Bird Island

What a trip we had today! The winds died down and the sun warmed us up. We left the RV park at 8 AM to go on a boat ride about 15 miles out in the Sea of Cortez to a group of large rocks called Bird Island. We rode on a cabin cruiser/fishing boat with two cabins, kitchen (galley) and flying bridge. There were only 9 passengers, the captain and his mate/brother-in-law. A little over half way out, we spotted a large area of splashing, rough water. The captain immediately turned the boat towards this disturbance. It was a huge pod of dolphin! There must have been a thousand of them. We cruised slowly among them, watching them jump, race with the boat, running in and out! It was truly awesome! I hated when we had to move on.

Bird Island not only has thousands of birds around it but is also the habitat of sea lions. As we approached the rocks you could hear lots of barking. The sea lions were everywhere! Some had even climbed up on some pretty high crags of rock, we don't know how they got so high. The bulls were mostly sunning themselves while the pups were cavorting in the water. Some were just barking just to hear their echo off the rocks, others seemed to be challenging each other. We cruised around the island and then anchored just off shore. John and another lady took kayaks out to float near the sea lions. The pups were the curious ones and would swim out toward the kayak in groups but never got closer than 10-15 feet before diving and swimming under the boat. One sea lion was swimming along and came up right in front of John. I think the sea lion was just as startled as John was!

While John was kayaking, I got the binoculars out to look at the birds. I looked at cormorants and seagulls and there were lots of them but some others kinds of birds as well. Some of the baby birds were covered with downy white fur and seemed bigger than the mother bird that was feeding them. We had lunch of burritos and cerveza on board the boat and then headed back to Rocky Point.

But the captain wasn't done showing us a good time. He stopped and strung 6-hook line on several rods and showed us how to fish with it. We were catching some type of rock fish 2, 3 or 6 at a time. They threw these in a live well and used them as bait fish. Then John, another guy and the captain started fishing for some big fish. The captain hooked one first. He caught a 36 pound Gulf Grouper. That was exciting. Then John and this other guy caught a round flat fish with teeth that the captain called a Lady Finger. It was about 10 inches across and gave John and really good fight. Great Day!

We got back in the park in time to share a carry-in dinner with our travel group. We're tired now!