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Published: February 24th 2005
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The day we arrived in Puerto Escondido, Marn, Steph, Derek and Jonathan had been out on a dolphin watching trip. In fact, we bumped into them just as their boat was pulling onto the harbour. They were raving about it. "Thousands of them," they said. The dolphins were apparently all around the boat, jumping about and generally re-enacting scenes from tacky beach towels. The tale of their adventure grew as the day wore on. Marn, it seems, had spent the morning in telepathic dialogue with the dolphin high priestess, who had shared with her prophecies of the coming transformation of dolphin and human kind. Steph had ridden about on leaping dolphins like some cracked-out mermaid, while Derek had toured the ruins of lost Atlantis and been a guest of the dolphin king. Jonathan, in fact, was the only one who had no wild tale to relate, although there was something unsettling in his serene smile and thousand yard stare.
In short, then, it seemed that here was an experience we couldn´t pass up. So, at the crack of dawn, Vanessa, Kim and I stumbled, full of hope, into a boat with Carlos, our guide and driver.
The day started propitiously enough,
Family
Awww ... cute with a beautiful sunrise silhouetting and enormous cross on a mountain (home sweet home) as we were motoring out to rendez-vous with, apparently, half the dolphins in the Pacific. Carlos had told us what to watch for, and sure enough, about half an hour later at a cry from Vanessa, we had found our first dolphin. Much excitement ensued, and in no time the three of us were perched precariously over the bow watching four or five dolphins twist and turn by the boat. The initial flush of excitement, however, shortly faded. No jumping and cavorting, communing and transforming dolphins these. They seemed, in fact, a little tired, a little bored, as if they were going through the motions. Like actors after years strutting out the same role on the same stage, they tried to put on a show of frolicking and cavorting, but the performance was wooden and forced.
I began to suspect that we had been had. Where were the dophins as far as the eye could see? Where was the jumping and talking? It occurred to me that perhaps the Blanshay clan had negotiated some sort of refund for themselves in return for offering up a fresh
Turtle
OOOH... Yeah... That´s it, right there... set of suckers. This was only confirmed when, at Carlos urging, I donned mask and snorkel and jumped in the water in pursuit of my own tour of Atlantis and the dolphins immediately flew the coop.
I climbed back in, a little salty and a little cynical, and we set off again. At this point, however, we had been on the water over an hour and I was convinced that was the last dolphin we would see. I was mustering my arguments for a refund and steeling myself to make my own Faustian bargain, selling out the next set of suckers, when I heard a high pitched squeaking sound behind me. Turning, I see Carlos pursing his lips and emitting the piercing staccato whistles and clicks we all know from Flipper. "What is this?" I think to myself. Who does he think he's kidding?The cheap vaudeville trickery might impress the tourists, but it's not going to distract me from my refund.
And then, lo and behold, turning back I spot a single grey siren suspended in a perfect arc over the waves. And in no time at all, the boat is surrounded, dolphins leaping and cavorting for hundreds of yards in all directions. Silhouetted against the rising sun, an entire family complete with wee baby bounce up and down through the surf like a mural in a new age meditation centre. Small pods race leaping right in front of the boat. The three of us are thoroughly transported, mindlessly crying out every second as each jumping dolphin hits us like a singular and thoroughly unexpected miracle. Carlos smiles smugly in the back and continues to whistle and click like some fairy sea-herd.
After about half an hour of being awestruck, Carlos suggests a swim. Mask and snorkle back on, I slip into the water and look around. Suddenly, I'm at the dolphin ball. They are dancing around me, seemingly right in front of my nose but always just out of reach. And they are talking to me, the eerie whistles coming from far and near.
Needless to say, after about an hour of swimming about and racing the boat around with pods of hundreds or perhaps thousands of dolphins, we are entranced. The cynicism has melted away, and it seems to me that the dolphins are trying to communicate with us, if we could only understand. There is something in the pattern of their jumping, in the ghostly whistles, which holds some great secret we have lost over the aeons. They are trying to give it back to us, this lost knowledge, if we only knew how to listen to them.
On the ride back, thoroughly contented, we encounter a sea turtle which Carlos proceeds to haul into the boat. Pictures are taken, shells and fins are examined. But just before the turtle is released, I see something that shatters the illusion and brings my cynicism rushing back. Carlos has slipped a fifty-peso note into the turtle's shell. Keeping it to myself, I angrily despair that there is no magic left in this world that is not mediated by the mighty greenback (or the lowly, stooped, and near broken yellowback, in this case). By the time we see the humpback whale my only thought is that at the distance he's staying and the lazy half-hearted way he breaches the surface and disappears, he must be trying to renegotiate his contract.
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anonymous
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30 cm of snow here today...your photo of a beautiful young woman interfering with a turtle was much appreciated - taciturn in toronto