Sea of Cortez. June 30th trip by Brooke Jolley

Just four hours south of Phoenix lies the small town of Puerto Penasco, Mexico. In the Marina is a liveaboard like none I have experienced before. I first experienced the uniqueness of this beautiful vessel, dramatic diving and crew that have become like family, in 2009. I stepped on board and was greeted by Dora the explorer herself, along with her husband Lolo, the captain, and crew who I later discovered took such pride in the boat because they were the ones who built it. That experience was so spectacular that I have returned multiple times over the past three years and have thoroughly enjoyed exploring every inch of the Northern Mid Riff Islands as well as the wonders and gentle giants in the Revillagegigo Islands, better known as the Socorro Islands. 

On June 30^th, 2012, I was once again aboard the Rocio Del Mar headed out to the Northern Mid Riff Islands in the Sea of Cortez for the first trip off the season. The boat was full of Arizona locals, many repeat divers such as myself. The weather was beautiful and the seas calm. We began the trip at Angel Island, diving the familiar rock that resembles an angel’s silhouette in a glistening sea. The group was split into 2 groups, our dive master Ray leading the way. The water was warm in the low 80’s and our group spent the majority of time floating over the sand watching the blue spotted jaw fish pop in and out of their holes. Then a giant golden jaw fish was spotted. We hovered over him, photographers snapping pictures and the rest of us excited to see those giant eyes peering up at us. We felt a bit of a current and decided to go for a little drift. Safety sausage deployed and the sound of the zodiac above us we let the current take us where it willed. We surfaced and were ready for a great week of diving.

Another memorable dive was at Lolo’s cove. I have dove these sites often but always find new and interesting creatures that I have never seen in my life. This dive was not to be missed; there was so much to see. I stopped to take photographs of a tube anemone and when I got close I realized this anemone had a friend, a small blue and yellow Lucas shrimp. I love macro photography so this was a treat. 

Finally, I moved on to find a white nudibranch with orange spots and then another one. As I’m diligently trying to get a picture worthy of this little jewel of the sea, I feel a tap on my shoulder. Two huge octopuses are right in front of me, one on the rock the other underneath. I believe we were interrupting something but I continued to take pictures anyway. Another tap on my shoulder, it’s Ray our dive master. He has found a Mexican horn shark and is pointing in the direction, I see a bunch of divers huddled but I’m involved with what I’m doing and don’t make it over to see the shark. No worries, we found another before the dive was through. The whole week was full of horn sharks and turtles more than I’ve experienced here before, large ones and free swimming.

Another of my favorite dives was at Ravijunco. This dive had a bit of a drift. It was a fun ride and so diverse. I saw everything!! Horn sharks, turtles, at least three, free swimming octopus, nudibranchs, free swimming green moray eels. It was a really fun dive the ocean was active and I along with the other Rocio Del Mar guests had front row, first class seats to the show.

Next was Coralitto, the sea lion dive. I will say this dive was the most enjoyable sea lion dive I have experienced. These sea lions were so playful and so were the divers. I watched them both turn and spin and hang upside down. It was one of the most genuine acts of play I’ve ever seen in my entire life above or below the sea. After a good twenty minutes of playing I wondered to the sand. At least one hundred hermit crabs were shifting through the sand on some sort of journey, migration? Where are they going? I look up see tons of garden eels, white ones, swaying in unison. I swim around them being patient and taking photos, as I move into a more foliaged part of the sandy bottom I find more garden eels, brown ones. More picture taking. We finish our dive with more sea lion play and find that the other group had explored right and we had explored left of our zodiac drop off. I was very excited about my garden eels and hermit crabs but they had found a giant pacific sea horse.

After a persuasive talk with our dive master Mayo, we convince him to take use on a twilight dive. We are headed out to find the sea horse. Mayo leads us to the spot where his group had found the sea horse. He shows me a little pile of strategically placed rocks. He had marked the spot, I guess I’m not so persuasive, he had known we would want to go looking for the rare and hard to find sea horse. We looked and looked and looked, finally fifteen to twenty minutes into our search one of our group had found the horse about 10 feet down closer to the sandy bottom. Lots more time for pictures, we finished out our dive as the sun set. We turned on our flashlights and swam around watching a large green moray eel swimming under us in and out of the rocks hunting for dinner. We turned off our lights and enjoyed a glowing bioluminescent light show as we waved our hands through the water. Once onboard our fellow divers had eaten and were enjoying beverages as we cleaned up and headed down for dinner. This boat knows how to accommodate its guests.

Not all of the excitement seen on the Rocio Del Mar takes place under water. We had several whale and dolphin sightings. Some of which we grabbed our mask snorkel and fins and hopped in the zodiacs to take pictures, watch them jump and flip, swimming through the wakes of our Zodiacs. One night after dinner when the moon was high, half of our group out on a night dive the rest watching fish gather at the stern of the boat attracted by the large light beaming down on the water, we saw gathering and feeding “El Diablo”, the Humboldt squid. These squid were approximately three feet in length, flashing as they jetted in all directions feeding on the small silver fish.

We had several more exciting dive days, full of delicious food, new friends and amazing diving adventures but the Rocio Del Mar always has another surprise up her sleeve. We had our rooftop carne asada dinner under the stars and consolidated our fast friendships with drinks and dancing, jokes and lively banter. A wonderful time was had by all. It was our last day at Sea, and we had no idea how wonderful a day it would be. The groups were split in two, one headed out diving, the other to the Whale Sharks. “Vamos abuscar ballena”, the crew had made attempts to teach me some Spanish. “Let’s go find the Whales”. Ballena Tiburon, yes we found them. We found several of them. One the largest I have ever seen at least 25 feet long, missing a portion out of the top of this tail fin. We snorkeled with this whale shark and another smaller fifteen foot whale shark at the same time. To be surrounded by Whale sharks is truly surreal. We swam and swam, in and out of the boats, finding another and another, a baby about eight feet, ohh he was fast! Our zodiac captain and I are in the boat while the others are swimming when he spots a mobula ray swimming along the surface. Excited I hop into the water and I see wings flapping and splashing as I startled him with my excited entrance into the water. Following Jorge’s directions I finally find the mobula ray. He is swimming below me in graceful circles and then as I finally stopped swimming and was just admiring the beauty and grace of this peaceful creature he turns and swims directly upward toward me, close enough to look me in the eye and then swims deep into the abyss and out of sight. This was two hours I know will be remembered by all that were lucky enough to experience it.