Gray whales are the most common whale sightings around the tip of Land’s End, and Cabo San Lucas offers many different types of vessels for whale watching January through March.  I wanted to be up high to look out and down across the water for better views.  So what better way to whale watch then from a pirate ship?

The Buccaneer Queen is an adventure of its own.  “Pirates” navigate the ship across the ocean blue with its scallywag passengers on the lookout for the “kraken”, the legendary beasts that lurk beneath the surface. 

“Thar she blows!”  shouts an exuberant pirate from the top deck, pointing the way to a large gray mass with a misty cloud hanging over it.  Soon another, then another.

We spotted a small group of two mothers with their calves.  From January to March, gray whales and other whale species give birth and raise their calves in the warm waters of the Sea of Cortez. The whales breathe multiple times in a short minute, hunch their backs, and wave goodbye with their tails as they dive down below.  On the other side we spot a whale spyhopping, lifting its huge head out of the water than sinking back down.  Later, a mother slaps her pectoral fin on the water surface, while a young calf completely breaches out of the water, the white splotches on its fins and freckled gray belly totally visible.

The gracefulness of their movements, the beauty of their shyness, I could watch them all day.  Soon though it was time to head back to land with a chorus of “Yo Ho! Yo Ho! A pirates’ life for me,” by our crew and young pirates-in-training. 

Off in the distance, I could still hear the faint breathe of a magnificent leviathan.