Today National Geographic Venture made a visit to Laguna San Ignacio. While the gray whales are still coming in from their northern feeding grounds, the abundant wildlife of the bay provided a spectacular day of exploration for our guests.
The warm, shallow waters of the lagoon attract many kinds of wildlife seeking a warm place to spend the winter. Female California gray whales arrive here at the end of January each year to calve their young. Shorebirds, gulls, dolphins, and sea birds all gather here in large numbers, either to stop briefly during migration, or instead spend the entire winter here to birth and rear young.
To best view the wildlife up close, we were transported around the lagoon by local guides in pangas after a long and bumpy Zodiac ride to the beach. Inside the lagoon, a few wind-blown whitecaps danced over the water. A number of gray whale calves were seen near our pangas. When the whales finished feeding, there was time to see the rich variety of birds surrounding us.
