Elephant Seals at Año Nuevo State Park [Photo Collection]
In what is becoming a regular Holiday thing for Evelia and I, we took time during my winter break to see some of the amazing sights along the Pacific Coast Highway (aka California 1).
Earlier this summer, we spent an afternoon at Año Nuevo State Park, which is one of the original rookeries for the Northern Elephant Seal. Twice thought to be extinct, the population has been slowly recovering from what may have been as few as 20-40 survivors around 1900.
During our June visit, there were only a few males, and while I did get some nice shots, most were from an extreme range, and since they were molting, the males weren’t very active.
Not this time...
Beginning mid-December, the park conducts small-crowd (about a dozen or so at a time) guided tours as the Seals return to pup and breed. Because of the restrictions, reservations do tend to fill quickly, so I have had this on our calendar since late summer. Tours aren’t expensive ($9.50 per person, plus the $9 park entrance fee) but they are not refundable or reschedulable.
And with all the rain and generally gloomy weather, I'd been really watching the forecast during Christmas week.
Fortunately, the day could not have been more perfect, as while it did indeed rain all that night and into the morning, the weather broke about an hour before our tour and our hike down to the rookery (about 5 miles there and back) was calm, sunny and in the mid-60's.
Being our first guided tour, the only mistake I made was bringing along my 600mm lens, as I anticipated that I'd be setting up a tripod and taking some distance shots. That theory was pleasantly destroyed when our Park Guide warned the group to stay at least 25’ away from the males, as they can move a lot faster than expected. I asked after that comment if we were really going to get that close and her reply was that today, absolutely.
She wasn’t kidding… I ended up never using the 600mm lens, instead doing all of my shots with my much lighter and faster-focusing 70-300mm Tamron. But Evelia unfortunately had to carry the big one around for most of the hike. Lesson learned.
It was a bucket-list day for me as we did indeed get (safely) up close and pretty personal with these magnificent creatures. The guides were fantastic, keeping everyone well-herded, showing their love of what they do throughout the day.
For anyone considering it, don’t even think twice. Just go:
FULL ALBUM:
Michael Edward Kohlman likes this.