And it’s a swordfish! Our sunset cruise had a fairly typical excursion: beautiful bottlenose dolphins in the bay, dainty, playful common dolphins, a huge mola mola (largest bony fish on earth!) and some lounging sea lions. What we were not expecting was one of the rarest and coolest fish w’ve seen on our trips: a swordfish! It was casually surfing in the calm swell, only showing two tiny tips of its dorsal and caudal (tail) fins. We really only figured out what it was when deckhand, Taylor (an avid fisherman), called out swordfish! Sure enough, it turned into the sunlight and we saw this magnificent animal. Swordfish spend most of their time in 1000 to 2000 foot of water hunting for big squid and only come up to the surface to help digest their food and sleep.
In all my years of whale watching and working on boats, I’m so happy I can still see something for the first time!
Naturalist – Colleen
