Together in Blue
10 days of scuba diving with giants in the Revillagigedo Archipelago
by Sonja Saxe
250 miles off the tip of Baja California is the Revillagigedo Archipelago, a small volcanic island chain whose unassuming profile above the surface belies the amazing creatures that live just beneath the waves. Large pelagic animals like oceanic manta rays, humpback whales, and countless shark species frequent this little corner of the ocean.
After years of waiting and dreaming of diving in these waters, I am finally aboard the Quino el Guardian bound for the storied archipelago. Our trusty boat will whisk us between three of the four islands that make up the island chain—San Benedicto, Roca Partida, and Socorro—over the course of ten days. Each day we will complete three to four dives and each dive will offer endless opportunities for encountering giants.
I wake up just past 6AM. It’s our first day at sea and I’m in the rocking belly of the boat in a tiny bed in a tiny room. The walls groan with every pitch and roll and I’m now too awake to fall back to sleep. Despite the complete darkness, I know that the sun is just starting to illuminate the sky. Eager to get out of the noisy room and breathe fresh air, I grab a sweater and head to the top deck where I am greeted by a pale blue sky awash with pastel clouds and cerulean waves stretching to the horizon. In this moment, the immensity of the ocean and the reality of the trip hits me. We are so far from solid ground and so little separates us and the countless fathoms below.
We spend the entire day making our way to San Benedicto Island where we have two days of diving planned. To learn more about the area and the animals we will hopefully see, we watch presentations from a park ranger, a dive master, and a manta ray expert. The Revillagigego Archipelago is famous for its friendly manta ray population who love to glide over divers and feel their bubbles. I’ve never seen a manta ray before and these friendly mantas are one of the reasons I chose these islands as my first liveaboard destination.
Our first dive of the trip is scheduled at San Benedicto Island at 8AM in a spot known as “The Canyon.” Most of the dive sites are at locations with cleaning stations—areas where large animals like manta rays and sharks come to get parasites and dead skin “cleaned” off of them by smaller cleaning fish.
I head to my scuba station early and begin putting together my gear. I click hoses into place, check my Nitrox mix, load up my weights, and ready my dive computer. Once my dive group is ready we pile into a rubber dinghy. The driver adeptly starts the motor and we hurtle toward our drop-off point. The sun is still low in the sky; crepuscular rays shine down in beams and turn the water into liquid gold.
A few short minutes later we are at our drop off point. We put our masks and regulators in place and the driver slowly counts us down, “One….two….three”. On three I roll back into the water with a splash and find myself in a new world. The cloud-dappled sky is replaced by an endless turquoise scene filled with fish that flit back and forth all around me as I descend to the inky depths.
It isn’t long before we make it to the cleaning station and find it teeming with life. I’ve never seen so many sharks at once. We’re surrounded by silver tips, Galapagos, and white tip reef sharks. I try to count them but lose track as they keep circling and moving while more keep arriving. We stay at the cleaning station for thirty minutes and then begin to ascend to our safety stop. We didn’t see any manta rays, but this dive has already climbed the ranks to the best dive in my life.
A few hours later that first dive is bested by another visit to the cleaning station where we encounter our first friendly manta which stays with us for a majority of the dive. It gracefully glides in circles around our group, singling out each of us to visit. Its eyes lock onto us as it passes by. As I curiously watch the manta ray, I can tell it is watching me back at me with its own curiosity. The magnitude of this mutual curiosity fills me with awe and gratitude.
It is time to move on to our second diving destination: Roca Partida, which is more of a large rock in the middle of the ocean than an island. It is a mere 330’ long and 26’ wide.
After a few days of diving I fall into a routine. Between each dive, I head up to the top deck where I enjoy the sun and keep a vigilant eye on the water to spot whales. This is where I find myself between our second and third dives at Roca Partida. I sit on the deck and let my feet dangle off the edge of the boat, my eyes fixed on the horizon. Suddenly, a loud exhalation breaks the silence. A whale surfaces mere feet in front of the boat, and then a second miniature version surfaces. It’s a mom and her calf and they are heading straight for Roca Partida. “Please stay in the area!” I plead with the whales.
We splash for our third dive in the early afternoon and I try to temper my excitement about the proximity of the whales I had seen during our break. The chances of running into whales underwater, even with the clear visibility we have, are low.
Regardless of whales, the dive site is beautiful. Huge schools of fish interspersed with tuna and silver tip sharks surround us. It feels as if we’re swimming through fish rain as their silver bodies shimmer in the sunlight. After spending time with the schools of fish, our dive master leads us into the blue.
There is something in the water ahead of us—something huge and dark and dappled with white spots. It takes a moment for me to comprehend what I am looking at, but when I do the thought ricochets through my mind, “Oh my god, that’s a pectoral fin!” Slowly the rest of the humpback comes into view. She appears stationary as her pectoral fins shift imperceptibly forward and backward to stabilize her in the current. I am so in awe of her that I don’t notice her calf is at the surface until it swims down, having just taken a breath, and nuzzles under her jaw.
We spend ten minutes with the whales. Ten breathtaking, life-changing minutes. They eventually leave with one large flick of their tails and fade into the blue, leaving us looking at a wall of water while I wonder if I had just dreamt up the encounter in a state of Nitrogen narcosis.
The whales are the highlight of the trip, but the next few days of diving bring their own magic. One of the days we see schooling hammerheads on every single dive. On other dives we encounter manta ray after manta ray, some glide by without a second look and others stay with us for a few unforgettable minutes.
The morning of our final dive day is overcast, the leaden sky appears to droop toward the sea. We have four dives left but I am already beginning to feel the first pangs of sadness as the trip winds down. I am cold and the sun is obscured by clouds so it cannot offer any warmth as we head toward our drop spot. It is barely after 7AM and I am tired, the continuous days of diving have taken a toll, but as our dinghy driver counts us down I can feel a shift in my energy and the moment I hit the water I am revitalized. No matter how many dives I complete, the enchanted feeling of entering a new world never diminishes.
As we descend, I take a moment to look up at the surface and see the unmistakeable silhouette of a dolphin. It also sees us. It changes its course and rockets toward us, eager to check us out. It spends a few minutes dancing in our group, bouncing from one person to the next as it assesses each of us. Again the feeling of being watched by the animal I am watching overwhelms me. Eventually, the dolphin moves on with its day, disappearing back into the blue from which it appeared.
We wake up off the coast of Cabo San Lucas on the last morning of the trip. The sunrise paints the skies in the most vibrant shades of pink and the city lights sparkle in the early morning twilight. It is a whirlwind as we gather and pack up all of our gear.
Finally, the time comes to disembark. In ten short days, a group of strangers became my close friends. We take one final group photo and instead of saying “goodbye” we exchange “see you again somedays.” We all plan to return to the Quino el Guardian for another magical trip to the Revillagigedo Archipelago. Until then, I’ll dream about its deep blue wonders and count the days till I make my next splash.
