whale talker

So, today is my 70^th birthday. As The Grateful Dead said, “What a Long Strange Trip It’s Been”! Born into a WWII War zone in Tallinn, Estonia, refuge camp in Sweden, New York, San Francisco, Menlo Park, Tucson, Sebastopol, Palo Alto, Ukiah and now El Cardonal (Mexico), and this is where I make my “stand”; working with The Cetacean Nation, swimming with The Critters and very literally living the simple life. My thanks to all of you that graced my years during this journey, none of you are forgotten. May The Great Mystery bless you all.

This is not my pic but I had to put it in. The “ART” of nature!

We received some blessed rain a while back and the desert responded in every imaginable color of green. Later on the 25^th we got some real rain and the desert went ballistic. I love to watch this transformation, it’s breath taking……and the smell, hoohah!!

The desert behind "Shangri-La

One of the young girls in town, now a woman (?), had her Quincenera on the 12^th. Big affair, music, costumes, dancers, food, tequila…..amazing! Each year I notice the families trying to outdo each other on the extravaganza. It’s tradition, and I honor that but the money spent is ludicrous. No different than HS graduation in The US but these folks are village people. The “lucky” girl gets one of these on her 15^th birthday. Of course not ALL the girls get one…..ah, same old, same old.

The young "woman"

Last blog post I talked about my Scorpion friend in my bootie (no, not that kind of bootie), a couple of days ago I was putting some kayaking gear into my ditty bag and when I stuck my hand in I felt something soft and hairy…..BIG spider! Not a Tarantula but definitely one of our bigger spiders. No bite though, so I let him go.

By the 19^th of the month I had been out in my kayak 5 times to The WZ without any critters of any kind to swim with. Totally cool though because I love the solitude and QUIET out there. On the 24^th however I finally came across some of my Cetacean friends. As usual I went out to the 2 mile mark and greeted the Four Sacred Directions and their guides. Then I waited. After about an hour I started a slow paddle in, Sea was flat, took my time, stopping every now and again to listen for a blow. About a mile in I heard the faintest blow. For a while I couldn’t figure where it was coming from. Definitely Dolphin, not Whale…..but where? As it got louder I finally saw their dorsal fins coming toward me from the north and well within intercept distance. At first I thought there were only 2 or 3 but then I saw that it was a good sized herd of maybe 20. I kayaked into their midst and they playfully scooted under my kayak and seemed perfectly happy to have me kayaking along with them. After they picked up speed I decided to go in and on the way ran into 2 more. I dove in with these two but was only able to swim with them for a short while. EACH time it is delightful and new.

Common Pacific Dolphins as my kayaking buddies

The Humpbacks are coming. My friend Ian who runs Exotikite down here said he saw 3 HBs while kite surfing off Los Barriles a couple of days ago. I expect to see them any time here in El Cardonal.

Urmas vs Scorpions, 125 to 4.

I’m going to dinner tonight with a few friends at our local gourmet restaurant here in El Cardonal to celebrate my birthday. While I was there the other day to make reservations I struck up a conversation with a couple of guys who had just had a Cajun Gumbo for lunch. When they heard that my birthday was coming up they bought me a take out order of the gumbo so I wouldn't miss it. Turned out I had met these same guys at a party in Cabo Pulmo 8 years ago, how cool is that? BTW, the gumbo was OUTSTANDING.

Once again, thank you for your kindnesses, support, love and respect. Que les vaya bien!

Oh, BTW, I have moved my entire website onto this blog. It’s my record of the past 35 years of research and adventure. Lots of pictures, stories, whale facts etc. The pages are to the right of the beginning of the blog under “From My MioSah Website”.