I sat in the back which I rarely do in Shaun’s work car as it tends to wallow a bit. I did this though because Simon had a cold and I didn’t want to catch it. His cold was non-Covid – he was testing daily, as we had been, because he was due to go to America as well. However, who wants any sort of cold on holiday?
Within an hour I was feeling rather carsick! In fact it got so bad that we had to stop at a motorway service station. (Quick aside here – as I staggered into the ladies’ toilet, barely able to walk upright, tears pouring down my cheeks and in obvious distress, I was saddened that not one person reached out to ask if I needed assistance. What a sad state of affairs! I like to think that if I’d seen somebody in such a state I would have asked if they needed help, even if I kept my distance.) Anyway, enough of that! I soon recovered and for the rest of the journey, sat in the front and was as right as rain. 

The next day was free till 3 pm and we spent it exploring the Cabrillo National Monument (or the lighthouse, as I remember it) and doing rather too much walking in the hot sun! We had a beer and something to eat in a local bar, and generally began to feel like we were on holiday.

At 3 pm we made our way to Fisherman’s Landing and were able to board our boat, Searcher. We had our passports and temperatures checked before being taken to our cabin which was one of only two on the main deck.

There was no meal that first night – and  we weren’t allowed to use the facilities on board till we sailed at 9 pm – so everyone went backwards and forwards ashore for food and bathroom. And there was still a mad dash for the toilets – sorry, ‘heads’ – as soon as we set sail.

As we left the port, we watched San Diego’s beautifully lit skyline and were heralded by sea lions and herons at the bait stations in the harbour as we drifted by.

But we soon forgot about the fog when the call, “Whale! 11 o’clock!” came over the tanoy (11 o’clock being its position in relationship to the boat, not a time-check!).

And then I had my first sighting of a proper whale! The dorsal fin of a humpback whale appeared and was joined, almost immediately, by a smaller one.

For 50 magical minutes, that seemed like 5, we watched, entranced, as mother and calf blew, and raised and slapped their tails. Soon they were joined by a pod of dolphins and, after lunch, we were treated to the rare sight of a mola mola ocean sunfish. What a weird creature!

The next day Shaun felt a lot better. I began to think that I was getting Simon’s cold too, but I soon forgot it because we had arrived at the main destination of the trip: San Ignacio Lagoon, home, for part of the year, to Baja’s friendly grey whales.

Now forgive me, but the word ‘lagoon’ conjured up, for me, a picture of a secluded area of water surrounded by palm trees and/or mangroves, peaceful and still, where we would float around surrounded by whales. Quite where I thought 70 pairs of grey whales would fit into this idyllic scene, I don’t know, but I wasn’t expecting the 25 x 8 mile area of sea, semi-protected by a sandbar! It was still ‘out at sea’ (where any sensible person would expect there to be whales).

Waiting for us in this lagoon were three ‘pangas’, solid,  wooden boats with outboard motors, driven by ‘panguerros’ .

It’s a good job those boats were sturdy and there was no danger of them tipping over.

Because as soon as the first baby whale approached the panga to investigate, the seven or eight occupants all lurched to hang over the same side, to dangle hands in the water, and realise a dream.

I’m not sure I can describe the ecstatic feeling as a gigantic baby whale slowly surfaces right next to the boat. It’s surreal. And when that baby looked me in the eye and then rolled over for a tummy tickle, I felt I could slip into the water with him and join in the game of sliding under the boat and making the humans race from side to side. If that wasn’t magnificent enough, he was then gently shoved away by mama, three times the size, who had been keeping a watchful eye from the depths below!

The physical sensation of their skin was like touching an aubergine in a bowl of water.

But the brimming in your heart, the catching of your breath, and the total desire to leap into the water with them, was other-worldly.

Was I scared? Not in the slightest. These gentle, curious mammals bear us no malice, despite the atrocities suffered by their relatives and ancestors at the hand of man. They are majestic. I wanted to bow before them.

For the next two days we went out four times a day in the pangas and Shaun and I had encounters each time. Not all the pangas were so lucky!

The last encounter was the best. For twenty minutes a baby whale played with us. I wanted to upload a video here, but I have failed miserably! So, you’ll have to be content with the above photos. 

Early that morning we docked in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, to disembark and continue our journey.

 We were well within Mexican and Costa Rican regulations to do so. But testing negative or waiting out quarantine doesn’t mean you are automatically well! The twenty-hour journey that ensued for me and Shaun, from San Jose, Mexico, to San Jose, Costa Rica (that was confusing on the flight itinerary, I can tell you) was torture for me. It was my first day up and the last thing I should have been doing was travelling. (Well, I suppose picking cotton or mining for coal would be worse, but you know what I mean!)

We arrived at a hotel in San Jose, Costa Rica at 1 a.m only to have to leave again, for the next leg of our journey, at 6.30 a.m.

SPIDERS!

The only good thing about these Golden Orb weaving spiders

was that they preferred their webs to anywhere else and they didn’t move much.

The lodge turned out to be rather formulaic. They were accustomed to turning the guests around every two days, but we were staying three. So we weren’t terribly impressed when the already uninspiring menu was repeated on the third day. Instead, we got a local water taxi and ate in the town which was buzzing with people, local shops, bars, restaurants and happy, cared for dogs. They all reminded me of Mokey in their laissez faire attitude which comes, I believe, of being allowed to roam freely. There were no dog fights, none of them took any notice of we humans, and they were tolerated everywhere.

Mauricio, our driver/guide for the rest of the trip, met us at San Jose airport. We then had a four hour drive to the Cloud Forest.

Mauricio was a lovely chap. We really liked him. But he seemed to think that we shared his obsession for birding. Don’t get me wrong; we love birds. Shaun is a bit more interested than I am, because of his passion for photographing them. But we don’t particularly enjoy spending hours searching for them. Mauricio’s idea of a hike meant stopping every ten paces to reposition the scope and wait for whatever bird he’d identified calling amongst the chorus of hundreds. On our second hike, it took one and a half hours to progress 50 metres from where we had parked the car! To be honest, I wasn’t well enough to go on a real hike anyway, but then, I find standing around just as exhausting.

We left the Cloud Forest after two days and headed back to the coast. I was looking forward to normal, hot weather. But we were back in the humidity and the jungle.

Are you still here? CONGRATULATIONS!  And thank you for staying till now. Nearly finished!

Far from being by the sea, our last lodge was also in the jungle. And each cabin was very deep in the jungle. Isolated and atmospheric.

So, apart from the member of staff who had just guided us to our cabin, and Mauricio who had helped, there was no one around to hear my scream when the (second) BIGGEST spider I have ever seen (I did see one as big as a dinner plate in the Amazon) scuttled across the wall of our room, dropped to the floor and disappeared under the bed. The guys came racing back wanting to know if everything was all right?

Well, no. I was cowering in the middle of the bed like a cartoon mama avoiding a mouse (I like mice, for the record. I even like snakes. I just can’t stand spiders). They tried to find the spider. They saw it because one asked the other (in Spanish that they didn’t realise I understood) if it was a tarantula. Other replied, ‘No, it’s a (didn’t catch what he said) but it is gigantic!’

I’m sorry, but I was crying by now. I wanted to go home. I’ve tried not to harp on about it, but I still wasn’t well. I’d felt ill every single day since I’d come down with Simon’s-Cold-Covid, and this was the last straw.

They couldn’t find the spider.

They suggested it had gone, disappeared through the floorboards. WHAT?! And what’s to stop it reappearing and bringing all its relatives?

They had no choice but to give us another room and to my relief that had a tiled floor – no silly floorboards that critters could crawl between.

There was no glass in all that openness – just mesh!

Now, some expert is going to point out to me that that isn’t a spider (I’m looking at you, my big brother!). Well, it’s as good as, in my mind. 

It was bad enough that it was there. It was much worse when I had to get up in the night and it wasn’t. I told myself, very firmly, that it had gone back over the wall to the jungle. 

The idea was to swim, but there was a group of us and nowhere to change. The ground was very muddy and stony and I didn’t want to walk on it with bare feet. I did dunk my head though and slosh the cool water over my arms and face. It left a sticky residue on my skin which made me grateful that I hadn’t immersed myself totally. Naturally, after that, we had a very long, steep climb back, another long, steep descent and another hour on the very bumpy trailer! I’m not sure I would have managed if it hadn’t been for the tractor driver, who came with us on the hike, and very kindly took my backpack for me.

There are advantages in being old!

The sun had gone in, but that half an hour was enough to badly burn Shaun’s back, which probably hasn’t seen daylight for a decade. We didn’t think too much of it. But if you’ve ever been sunburned, especially on your back, you’ll know that, during the night, the sheets rub it raw and make it ten times more uncomfortable. Poor Shaun was in a lot of pain the next day.

The last night we had a guided night-time walk around the lodge’s grounds. If I’d known that meant crawling through the jungle, rather than walking sedately along the paths, I wouldn’t have gone. As it was, I left before the end and waited for Shaun back in the dining area. The frogs were pretty. But I couldn’t stand the spiders we could see, never mind the ones lurking in the dark that we couldn’t see. And the insects humming round the light of our torches? It just wasn’t for me.

and I will enjoy that memory for the rest of my life.

But the disadvantages of the jungle are enough to stop me wanting to visit it again.

The trials didn’t finish there though.

If you’ve made it to here, very well done! Just one more paragraph before the end.

I know I’ve bored you with my own health issues, but this time it was Shaun who was suffering. Remember that sunburn? Well, two nights of rubbing against sheets had made it far worse than it was originally and when we boarded our second, ten-hour-overnight flight, the skin on his back suddenly ignited. It itched and stung so badly that he was in agony. He couldn’t sit back, was trying hard not to scream with the pain (and this is a man who says ‘oh heck’ when a railway sleeper falls on his finger) and actually begged me to ask the crew for some morphine! Ummm! He refused to believe me when I tried to tell him that they wouldn’t be carrying morphine! And if they were, they certainly wouldn’t give him any! As it was though, our steward was great. He supplied us with paracetamol (thank goodness, my huge supply was exhausted), burn gel sachets (for kitchen burns) and a table cloth dipped in a bucket of ice water which we spread over Shaun’s bare back. Needless to say, neither of us slept for the entire flight. Shaun had intervals of relief, but also had to cope with feeling cold and not being able to sit back and relax.

It all went away when we landed. The steward gave us a technical explanation, but I won’t bore you with it.

We were both delighted to be home and give ourselves time to recuperate. But, to top it all, I then spent the next two days in bed with a tummy bug, high temperature etc!

So it wasn’t the BEST trip we’ve ever done. It’s hard to find pleasure in anything when feeling ill, but we did have some wonderful moments and despite it all, no one can take way the fact that

I TOUCHED A WHALE!

Thank you so much for reading and for staying till the end! Do let me know that you made it this far and I’ll send you a thumbs up!