Coral Reef Travel

I took a deep breath, raised my fins, and slipped beneath the surface near Fish Rock. Descending past strands of bull kelp and several rockfish, I zeroed in on an undulating layer of palm kelp dancing in the gentle surge. As if to announce my arrival, the kelp parted to reveal a generous welcoming gift – a rocky substrate covered with seven- to eight-inch red abalone.

(more…)

Tweet This Post

Sunlight slanted down to illuminate a sandy clearing in the kelp forest. Hidden in the shadows at one edge, I peered through a curtain of fronds, an interloper with a backstage pass to the drama of marine life on Anacapa Island.

(more…)

Tweet This Post

I float down a winding path through the kelp and out to the reef’s edge. A sandy canyon 20 feet wide stretches to the next ridge of rock, also thick with kelp. To my right, the canyon narrows and deepens, winding down out of sight under the kelp. A fat orange garibaldi that has been keeping me company swims lazily down into the amber darkness, like a troll leading me to an enchanted wood.

(more…)

Tweet This Post

It was clear that something was happening just the other side of that big rock. A large male lingcod, some three-and-a-half feet long, was floating several feet off the bottom, head up, and quivering with such energy that all the other fish seemed to stare at him.

(more…)

Tweet This Post

The Baja Peninsula is an 800-mile swath of desert, beaches and plateaus that stretches all the way from the U.S.-Mexico border at Tijuana to the famous rock outcropping known as Land’s End. It splits the Eastern Pacific from the Gulf of California (aka the Sea of Cortez) and creates countless diving opportunities on both its Pacific and Gulf coasts.

(more…)

Tweet This Post