Swimming with and Documenting Whale Sharks in Baja California
LA PAZ BAY WHALE SHARKS
Documenting whale sharks in Baja California Sur’s La Paz Bay is not the easiest task, not for lack of whale sharks, but because of the low visibility in the water. However, just swimming and observing them is incredibly fun and rewarding.
The bay hosts over 100 whale sharks each year during the windy season from October to April. Strong Baja winds cause large pockets of plankton to build up in several bays along the Sea of Cortez coastline in Baja California, which in turn attract hungry, growing juvenile whale sharks. This is one of the few places where you can reliably observe feeding whale sharks, and with ideal conditions you can swim with over a dozen different sharks in a single day.
BEHAVIOUR
Swimming with whale sharks is a great way to really appreciate the animal. This being said, respect is paramount to any wildlife interaction, whale sharks included. The way you behave as a diver (on in this case swimmer) can effect the natural behaviour of the sharks.
It’s important not to surround the shark or get in front of its swimming path. Therefore, all divers should stay on one side of a shark, maintain an ideal 2 metres of distance from it, and not cross in front of its head. Minimizing the amount of people in the water at a time (less than 6 is ideal) is a good way to keep a decent swimming distance without overwhelming or effecting the sharks’ natural behaviour.
The sharks here are interested in one thing— feeding. So they will not take any real interest in other objects in the water, and that includes you. So just stay out of their way and they will ignore you. Tiny plankton are a lot more attractive to them.
HANDLING LOW VISIBILITY
Visibility is generally poor, due to the amount of plankton and nutrients in the water, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing, as it’s super cool to observe the sharks feeding in their natural habitat.
As La Paz is known for strong winds, like the rest of the Sea of Cortez, it’s important to watch the wind charts carefully and pick a day where the wind is not so strong (ideally find a patch of days with low wind speeds and go on the last of those days hoping the water has calmed itself down by then).
I lived in Baja for two and a half months, so I was fortunate enough to be selective with my dates and watched wind charts carefully (this is something you get used to living in Baja as a diver). The wind can greatly effect the visibility. Having tons of plankton in the water is tricky enough, but high winds and waves kicking up silt and sand makes the trip near impossible.
From a documentation and photography angle, this presents a unique set of challenges, which require you to be both extremely close to the animals, yet far away enough so that you do not change their behaviour.
Unlike whales and dolphins, whale sharks are, at the end of the day large fish, and they are not interested in engaging with you or “swimming with you.“ Their eyesight is poor, and the lack of visibility in the water effects them even more than it effects you.
This means you should position at the side close to the head of the animal for as long as possible, and never dart into its swimming path. Whale sharks are generally predictable swimmers, sticking to a line and turning slowly when necessary. In La Paz Bay, their primary interest is feeding, so they go where the plankton is.
For U/W photogs out there, to document the sharks in La Paz Bay you’re going to want to go very wide angle, decently high depth of field and fast shutter speed (think: 12~16mm, f/8, 1/250). Given the normally murky visibility and the sheer size and speed of the animals, this is going to require you to sacrifice some ISO. I was typically shooting f/7.1 ~ f/9 at 1/250, between ISO 800~3000 depending on conditions.
HOW TO VISIT RESPONSIBLY
For better or worse, whale shark swimming in La Paz Bay has become a much publicized tourist activity from the resorts in Los Cabos, as it’s only a 2.5 hr drive north of Cabo San Jose and the whale sharks are very present in the bay between October and April.
The over-tourism in this area, has led to strict regulations being put into place to help safeguard the animals and limit the number of tourists and boats in the water. Many whale sharks have been injured by boat propellers, as the sharks spend much of their time feeding near the surface of the bay in daylight hours. While documentarians and true ocean lovers may fine these regulations annoying, as they were put into place to guard against mass tourism, be thankful they are in place at all, especially for the sake of the sharks.
The restrictions in place limit the amount of boats to just thirteen pangas per time block of the day (the day has been divided into 3 distinct time blocks) in the bay. The first time block is from 9 am to noon, then the second is from 11 am to 2 pm, and the last time block is from 1 pm to 4 pm. The hour of overlap is to account for travel time and registration. You are technically permitted to spend three hours in the reserve from the time you enter, but many of the companies (90% of them) only spend 2 hours because they want to reposition their boats to pick up another group of tourists and get back into the reserve for each time slot.
If you are keen on getting in in the first time slot, you will have to be waiting in line on your boat very early in the morning, as the only way to get into the reserve is to have everyone on the bat and registered with the marine authority at the entrance to the bay. To make the first slot, I’d guess you’d have to be on your boat by 7:45 am. Keep in mind the whale sharks become more active feeders as the sunlight becomes stronger, so to really observe feeding, the second time slot may be best.
Once you’re in the reserve and find a whale shark to swim with, strict protocols should be followed, meaning only five tourists plus a guide may be in the water at any one time and that you should maintain a distance of at least 1.5 metres from the sharks. The sharks are decently fast swimmers, so you’ll have to be able to keep up, and they will ignore you unless you’re directly in their way (don’t be in their way).
You must be wearing a wetsuit, otherwise you’ll be forced to wear a life jacket and that’s just horrible. Bring your own wetsuit or make sure you can rent one! Diving is not permitter (no weights), as misbehaving tourists have touched whale sharks in the past, so this has been ruined for everyone (with good reason, don’t touch the sharks!).
Having done this several times in La Paz, only Alonso Tours allowed us to spend the full three hours on the water and we were able to charter the boat privately just for us divers (no diving though, but we’re fast with our gear and spent our time properly documenting the whale sharks).
