“Here she comes again!” our guide Jose Sanchez announces as the female great gray whale approaches us for the fifth time in 45 minutes.
Each time our curious new friend returns to our fishing boat, she lingers a little longer on the surface, watching us the way we watch her.
It was our last trip to Mexico's San Ignacio Lagoon to see the gray whales, which the locals say are "friendly".
The engine is off, our boat is stationary, and this 40-ton female whale is playfully swimming around the vessel, raising her white-spotted upper half and positioning herself along the hull as if to get a good look at the six of us in the boat.
When the whale's eye, about the size of a baseball, comes to the surface and our eyes meet for a moment, I scream with delight.
We are told to watch the whales from a distance, but what about when they come close to watch us?
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Laguna San Ignacio, on the west coast of the Baja California peninsula, in the Mexican federal state of Baja California Sur, it is considered the last lagoon in the world where the Pacific gray whale reproduces and lives undisturbed.
A protected sanctuary for whales it is also the place of one of the most unusual encounters with wild animals in the world: here curious whales regularly and voluntarily seek contact with people.
Every year, from January to mid-April, thousands of gray whales arrive in the lagoon after a 19.300-kilometer journey from the icy waters of the Arctic to the warm waters of Baja California Sur to mate and give birth.
Although these waters are now safe for them, people used to hunt gray whales here.
But it seems that animals have learned to trust humans.
During my recent whale watching trip with Sanchez's eco-tourism agency Pure Baja Travels, mothers proudly showed us their cubs.
These unique encounters have fueled efforts to preserve and protect these gentle giants, and have provided an exciting yet responsible whale watching experience like nowhere else in the world.
Why do these whales seek contact with humans?
For more than 50 years, gray whales in the waters of this lagoon have shown interest in humans, as well as humans in them.
Marine biologists believe that there are several reasons for this unique behavior of whales.
"There are no real threats to them in the lagoon today," he says Dr. Steven Svarc, who has been studying gray whales in the San Ignacio Lagoon for 45 years.
Although gray whales are known to occasionally approach humans elsewhere, Swartz says this is the only place where they do so regularly, and where the animals linger around boats and often surface, allowing people to touch them.
Whale watching is only allowed in a certain "zone" of the protected area, and strict rules apply: only 16 small fishing boats are allowed at a time.
All boats must turn off their engines so as not to disturb the whales.
And most importantly, boat drivers do not chase or pursue whales.
"(The guides) bring you to the whales, and these mammals decide for themselves whether they want to come and say hello," says Swartz.
But why does it look like the whales are coming to greet you?
“Mammals are curious; they're sensitive enough creatures to want to learn more about their environment and learn by exploring," Swartz explains, adding that mothers pass that curiosity about boats and people on to their cubs.
"(Whales) can remember".
Whales are essentially tactile creatures, they like to rub their bodies, they like touch, that's how they communicate, explains Svart.
Pacific gray whales aren't busy looking for food here - they do that in the Arctic, so maybe they're bored, he notes.
Although we don't know exactly why whales behave this way, Svarc and other marine biologists agree that whales approach boats willingly.
An exemplary community that cares for whales
Gray whales were almost exterminated during the 18th and 19th centuries, which is why these animals were often aggressive towards humans, so much so that local fishermen even called them "devil fish" and avoided them.
But in 1972, while Francisco Pačiko Majoral was fishing in the lagoon, a whale surfaced and lingered next to his boat.
Out of curiosity, Majoral put his hand in the water.
Kit came up to him and touched his hand.
The news about Mayoral's experience spread, and the locals, now much less afraid, began to wait patiently for similar friendly encounters.
"Grey whales in particular are naturally curious and have never been afraid to approach floating objects in the water.
"People were hurting them, and the gray whales were responding to that kind of interaction," Sanchez tells me.
"After (Majoral's) first peaceful encounter, people began to realize that gray whales are not the scary and crazy animals they thought they were."
Sánchez was the first Mexican naturalist to start organizing whale-watching tours in the lagoon back in the 1990s, and his eco-tourism agency now has a base camp in San Ignacio Lagoon.
"As time goes on, people are less afraid to let gray whales get close enough to touch them.
"I believe the same is true (for gray whales)".
The Mexican government created the Laguna San Ignacio Nature Reserve in 1972, and in 1988 the lagoon was declared both a whale sanctuary and a biosphere reserve. The Viskaino, the largest wildlife sanctuary in Latin America.
Five years later, the reserve was listed UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.
The population of gray whales has recovered, and since 1994 this animal is not on the list of endangered species.
That year, Mayoral informed environmentalists that the Japanese company Mitsubishi and the Mexican government were planning to build a huge salt factory inside the nature reserve.
Thanks to the great efforts of the local and international community and a protest on the shore of the lagoon in which famous environmental activists participated, from the American lawyer and politician Robert Kennedy Jr. to the actor Christopher Reeves, the opening of the salt mine was prevented in 2000.
Today, the battle to save the gray whales in the lagoon is considered one of the the greatest successes in efforts to preserve wild animals.
Mayoral passed away in 2013, but he is called the "savior of gray whales" and the "Father of whale watching" in the lagoon.
Ever since his first peaceful encounter with a whale, visitors and locals have been wanting to have a similar experience in the lagoon.
And Mayoral's family is still organizing whale watching tours.
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The encounters between humans and whales in the San Ignacio lagoon not only encouraged efforts to preserve this species, but also contributed to the regulation of eco-tourism, which today is a significant source of income for the local community.
"Eco-tourism is the basic economic activity of the community.
"The locals take care of the lagoon and the whales and work together to do sustainable whale watching so they don't destroy or endanger the resources that bring them income, which are the whales," says Swartz.
During the five-day trips organized by the travel agency Pure Baja Travels, tourists go on six whale-watching tours (to give the animals more opportunities to come to the boats on their own), but also hear about the community's efforts to preserve the lagoon.
The camp is only open from February to March, then it closes when the animals migrate in April.
At our base camp with tents on the shore of the lagoon, I woke up almost every morning to the sound of whales calling in the distance, and during dinner I could watch them spout water like a fountain.
Sleeping near their sanctuary was almost as exciting as seeing them close at hand during the day.
The new generation needs to make additional efforts to protect gray whales
Although San Ignacio Lagoon, where gray whales are born, is now protected, additional efforts to protect the animals and support the local communities that keep them are more important than ever before.
Climate change is now affecting the lagoon and gray whales on their migration route.
Mexican climate activist Sowing the Bastide she hopes to inspire a new generation to step up efforts to protect whales, and says that's why she co-produced the documentary Lagoon of whales (The Whale Lagoon).
Twenty-two-year-old Bastida draws a comparison between the whale conservation efforts initiated by the previous generation in the local community and the climate crisis facing her generation.
She joined WildCoast, an international non-profit organization that has been leading gray whale conservation efforts for more than 25 years, to make the community's voice heard further and stronger.
Serž Dedina, co-founder and executive director of the organization WildCoast, worked on the permanent protection of about 182.000 hectares of habitat in the San Ignacio Lagoon, and contributed to the Mexican government's decision to add the San Ignacio Lagoon to the El Vizcaino Biosphere Reserve.
He says that the San Ignacio lagoon today is a model of how wild animals can be protected and at the same time achieve sustainable development.
The organization helps guide training for eco-tourism and promotion and expansion of the women-led mangrove restoration program and which contribute to the fight against climate change.
Fighting climate change that affects whale migration routes and restoring mangroves is another battle that residents in the San Ignacio Lagoon area fight every day, while also regulating development and tourism in the lagoon.
"There's something about whales that gives you deep feelings and almost a responsibility to take care of them.
"When a whale pushes a baby so you can touch it, it's a huge show of trust," Bastida told the BBC.
"We call them friendly whales, but I think they are conscious whales and they want us to be more aware of them and more in touch with them," she adds.
"I hope that if people watch the film or are lucky enough to see whales, they will discover a part of themselves that they didn't know existed - the instinct to protect them."
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