Travel Diary: Southern California

Dolphins, crabs, and sea lions, oh my!

The next stop on my family vacation was Dana Point. Even though it was nearing the end of whale watching season in the area, I was still hopeful that I’d be able to catch sight of a few. The tour we signed up for promised a two and a half hour boat ride along the coast in search of whales, dolphins, and other sea life. I stood at the front of the boat for most of the trip, even though it was quite chilly, determined to be the one to spot the first whale tail.

The boat ride, however, became monotonous as the captain, crew, and rest of us passengers were unsuccessful in our search. Luckily, three hours later — since no one wanted to go back to shore without a sighting of any sort at all — a different tour boat happened to radio in to tell our boat’s captain that he’d spotted a pod of dolphins in an area close to us. Our captain immediately changed course in that direction, and in less than 10 minutes, the other tour boat was in sight — along with hundreds of common dolphins!

I couldn’t believe it. Hundreds. I’d seen dolphins before in aquariums and caught sight of dorsal fins in the distance while sitting on a beach in Florida, but this was something else. The dolphins leapt and raced alongside our boat, curious about the watercraft and its passengers. What seemed like an endless number of dolphins (including baby dolphins!) surrounded the boat without any fear, swimming playfully. When we finally headed back to shore, I was left in awe of the truly wondrous experience.

The wondrous experience continued after a short drive to our next stop — Laguna Beach. While most of the tourists headed for the sandy beaches to enjoy the sun, my destination was the rocky area at the end of the beach. Here, during low tide, tide pools formed.

At first glimpse, there wasn’t anything interesting in the pools. There were some barnacles, mussels, and aggregating anemone, but nothing exciting like the brightly coloured starfish and urchins I’d hoped to see. However, upon closer inspection, I found molluscs called chitons that looked like fossils, tiny hermit crabs hiding from the crash of the waves, and a striped shore crab scuttling across the craggy terrain.

The next day, we drove to San Diego to visit La Jolla Cove. Before they were even in sight, my parents and I could hear the sea lions making a ruckus. We watched them sleeping in the sun, swimming gracefully in the water, and some of the males fighting. Some of them were only five metres away from us, but they hardly paid attention to any of the humans nearby who were taking photos and laughing at the amusing vocalizations they made.

On the beach, my dad and I met the tour guide for our snorkeling trip. The tour guide provided us with a full wetsuit and hood, and though he told us that the hood was optional, I decided that looking bald but being warmer was probably going to be better. This turned out to be a good move because as we entered the water at the beach, I realized that the water was actually freezing cold!

Just steps into the ocean, I could already see that La Jolla Cove was teeming with sea life. There were bright orange garibaldi (the official state fish of California) wandering around the reef, and South African zebra fish (also known as wildeperd and not to be confused with freshwater minnows) in schools of hundreds. The visibility of the water wasn’t as clear as it is at tropical locations such as the Caribbean, but there were lots of amazing sea creatures to be seen, including harmless horn sharks, a spiny lobster, a spider-like sheep crab, and of course, we got up close to the dozens of sea lions and their quieter neighbours, harbour seals.

These marine conservation areas and the sea life that’s living there are protected from being harmed or even harassed by humans. Tour guides and city signs in these areas emphasize that people should take nothing and leave nothing during their visit. Unfortunately, I noticed that many tourists and children were disrespectful of this rule and didn’t take care to avoid stepping on some of the sea creatures, and sometimes left garbage behind. These ecosystems are incredibly fragile and although some people may think that they will not leave a damaging impact by doing something so small, the overall effect is the accumulation of all the other people who also think that their impact isn’t significant. It’s important to remember the influence that our choices make, and to limit our use of single-use items like plastic bags, water bottles, and straws.By actively doing this, less garbage will end up in our landfills and in the beautiful oceans.

Stay tuned for a summary of my experience trying to be waste-free during my trip, and for part three of my travel diary where I write about visiting the Grand Canyon and Las Vegas.

Read Part One of my Travel Diary here.

*Update June 5, 2018: Click here to read Part 3. 

*Update June 15, 2018: Click here to read Part 4. 

*Update July 12, 2018: Click here to read Part 5. 

Photo by Karen K. Tran/The Ontarion