Photo by Geoff Carter
By Geoff Carter
Last week, we had the opportunity to go on a whale watching expedition and photo shoot in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. Banderas Bay, on which Vallarta is located, is a favored breeding ground for the great humpbacked whales. These magnificent creatures come from as far away as the waters off British Columbia and Hawaii to birth their calves here. This year was the first opportunity we had to view them as they only come to Banderas Bay from December to April, (their breeding period but not our best time for traveling)—until now. This beautiful and monumental bay is also home to dolphins, sea turtles, orcas, jellyfish, and thousands of other aquatic species. It is a beautiful habitat that has been—in part—protected by the Mexican government.
We went out onto the bay on a twenty-person inflatable speedboat with Diego, an experienced guide. I wondered how they knew where to go to find these massive creatures in this gigantic bay, sort of like finding a needle in a haystack. Banderas Bay is over forty kilometers long and boasts a sixty-eight-mile-long coastline encompassing an area of five hundred square miles. How anyone could find anything—even a creature as big as a whale—in there was beyond me. But they did. After only twenty minutes of cruising the bay, we sighted a humpback breaching the surface. Our guide Diego explained that it was breaching because a school of dolphins was pestering it and that she was trying to get rid of them. I had to wonder whether that particular whale thought the same of us as he did of those dolphins.
Diego and his company Vallarta Adventures are very cautious about disturbing the humpbacks in their habitat. After all, many of them are new mothers birthing and nursing their calves. Vallarta Adventures takes care not to approach them too closely. When other companies and private owners are not so scrupulous, a harbor patrol commissioned specifically to protect the humpbacks, will warn and fine those that violate these mammals’ spaces.
At the beginning of the tour, Diego explained that the whales who frequent the bay (and many will return year after year) display personality traits just like people. Some are shy, some are curious, and some are cautious—but they all don’t like dolphins. Whenever we sighted a single whale or a pod, the boat would stop at a distance of about thirty or forty yards and we would watch, take photos, and hope these creatures would approach us—which they sometimes did. One came within ten yards of us and displayed her flukes just before diving.
The tour took us to a variety of spots along the coast. While cruising along, I noticed a spate of new building—mostly condos—going up all around the bay. Puerto Vallarta is a beautiful spot and a magnet for retirees and expatriates, many of them American and Canadian, but the way the new construction was eating into the lush green hills surrounding the bay made me concerned whether enough safeguards were being taken to protect the vibrant ecosystem in the bay—and beyond.
In the past year or so, the city of Vallarta has seen an increase in the number of crocodiles moving to the Rio Cuale, which flows through the main part of the old city. One local told me that a gigantic new condo development/theme park/retail center has destroyed a major crocodile habitat. So they moved, as anyone would. I worried the same thing might happen to the humpbacks and other native creatures. Would rampant development, greed, and disregard for the natural system of ecological checks and balances spoil this beautiful bay? History says it would and probably will because our own species consists of many naked opportunists—people who are nothing more than an ultra-sophisticated breed of rats, spoiling and destroying everything they touch—all in the name of profit.
On the other hand, we have the conscientious and environmentally conscious types who spend their lives striving to—at this point—preserve the natural wonders of our planet. Not least among them is the Mexican government, which has designated several areas within the bay, including the Marietas Islands National Park and Los Arcos de Mismaloya as marine preserves designed to protect marine life, coral reef ecosystems, and maintain sustainable tourism which includes limited use of plastics and other forever materials.
Beaches along the bay are also committed to sea turtle conservation. A recent visitor described to me how he and a number of other bystanders scooped up dozens of newly hatched turtles who had taken a wrong turn on their way to the ocean. Their hatching areas are typically roped off and monitored by volunteers and professional biologists. People—some people—care.
Yet for all this, more and more high-rises sprout from the shores of the bay seemingly overnight—like mushrooms—bringing more people, more waste, crowding native species (like crocodiles) out of their native habitats.
The whales returned this year as they always have. Banderas Bay is absolutely huge, very deep, and thus so, partly inaccessible to humans, but the question remains as to whether the flood of people flocking to this tropical paradise will someday crowd out even the largest and most sublime of our fellow creatures.