Whale Watching from a “panga” in Baja

Ojo de Liebre (near the town of Guerrero Negro) is a vast lagoon protected from ocean predators. It is a safe place for mothers to give birth and couples to mate. It’s about 500 miles south of the Baja border with California. From January through March each year, gray whales arrive from the Bering Straits in Alaska. Mothers and babies will approach the relatively small “pangas” like the one in this photo. They are curious creatures who sometimes seek out human contact. They seem to be as fascinated by us as we are by them.

This mural marks the turn off from the town of Guerrero Negro to the whale watching dock. The lagoon is part of a biosphere where human contact happens when it is initiated by the whales and it is carefully regulated. My first visit to see the whales was in 2007, a year after moving to Baja. And I got to pet one!

Two gray whales come close to our “panga”.

A curious whale surfaces to take a look around. This is called spy hopping.

Some of the more playful whales appear to love being touched by humans. Others will get under the “panga” and gently rock the boat, apparently, just for the fun of it.

When the whale makes a deep dive and flaps its tail, it’s called fluking. Another behavior that can be seen from a safe distance is breaching. This is when the whale forces its massive body upwards partially out of the water, turns around and slaps down. This creates impressive splashing that can be seen for miles.

I had fun doing quick sketches of whale behaviors I observed and the massive skeleton outside the whale center (shown below).

If you live near the ocean in San Diego or Baja, this is the time of the year you may start seeing the whales moving south, hugging the coastline as they release air and ocean water through their blowholes. They usually travel in pods and tend to surface briefly for air, dive, and disappear for several minutes before resurfacing a few miles down the coast. 

I’ve had the thrill of observing an energetic young whale breach five times in front of me while I was standing at a whale watching pavilion in Bajamar. To say it was spectacular is an understatement.