Cruise Vacations
Otherworldly
Sea of Cortez By Keph Senett
With some of the most remote and biodiverse places on Earth, the Sea of Cortez is also known as the Galapagos of North America.
I’m rocked awake by the gentle juddering of the ship’s engine, a deep sigh after hours spent travelling through the night. Careful not to rouse my bestie, Kim, who’s snoring in the next bunk, I open the cabin door and walk out onto the deck. We’ve dropped anchor, it appears, on Mars. We’re in the middle of the sea, morning-placid except for the trailing ripples left by a low-flying pelican. The rising sun projects a lightshow onto rocky ridges rising from the water and there is not another single living thing in sight. I shake Kim awake, eager to share the view before the sun washes away the Merlot stain in the sky. 48 • Vacations ® • Winter 2019
I’ve never been drawn to desert landscapes. I imagined it a desolate, thirsty place of relentless heat and not much else, but when I learned about the Sea of Cortez – a gulf between the peninsula of Baja California and the Sonoran Desert in mainland Mexico – I was curious. What might it be like at the confluence of these opposite environments? Morning coffees in hand, Kim and I climb to the top deck of our ship, UnCruise Adventures’ Safari Endeavor. We gaze out at the volcanic rock, which turns pink and puce and purple in
