Album Notes

During three years I spent two winters in Baja California, camping and windsurfing all over the peninsula. Some of the tracks were recorded on my return home to 'Campo Fiesta del Norte', here on Sherman Island.

Track two was taken about a half hour before sunrise, as a Sage Sparrow greeted New Year's day, just outside the camp as far south of Punta Arenas as you can drive (almost to the north end of Bahia Sueno).

The Purple Martin I call 'impossible' because he was a thousand miles from where the field guides say you can find these birds- but there he was, big as day. I guess it's a good thing birds can't read. :)

The Power Lines sound like Tibetan monks chanting. You can only do this under ideal conditions; calm at the surface, with 30 knots or more of winds aloft. Pretty soon 125,000 volt power lines are humming like guitar strings played by the big guy.

The dolphins are played at half speed, because their whistles are at the very top of our hearing. (Actually, I'm sure they are far above, but the recorder only goes to about 20kHz). This was a pod of a couple hundred that flew past us at flank speed off the north end of Isla San Jose, about 70 miles north of La Paz, Baja Sur. They must have been late for the party or something.

The spring disappearing in sand was another rare occurrence. La Paz had just had its first hurricane in 40 years, and there was water everywhere in the mountains. Then, as it approached the foothills, it simply disappeared into the sand.

La bufadora was a blowhole in limestone cliffs south of the Punta Arena (there are probably a couple of dozen 'punta arenas' in Baja California) near La Ventana, Baja California Sur. On a fairly calm day, maybe two foot swell, what was left over from the last El Norte, drove air in and out of this underwater cave. The result sounds like the Old Man of the Sea taking an afternoon nap.

The last track is very special to me. Camped on the shores of Bahia San Nicolas, a couple miles north of San Sebastian, almost completely alone. The water there, off of limestone cliffs, gets deep fast- so the whales would come right up to the beach at night. In the middle of this cacophony of crickets, if you listen closely, you can hear Fin whale moms and their calves blowing in the background. Trippy.

I hope you enjoy these recordings, and enjoy the silence it takes to listen, to truly listen, to anything.