Suburban Naturalists or Flipper, Rated X

Sheryl and I took our usual walk to the pier this morning. As we prepared to run our 7 sets of the daunting stairs that are part of our workout, we had a welcome distraction- DOLPHINS! We often have dolphin-sightings when we do our walk but this was amazing. It started when I noticed a dolphin leaping out of the water. I stopped Sheryl so we could watch for another great leap, (and avoid that stair run!). Sure enough, another leap occurred. Troupers that we are, we got back to the work of running those stairs. At the top, we had to catch our breath. As we looked out at the ocean, we saw that the dolphins were body surfing, too. Leaping or surfing waves over and over again. There were so many pods of adults and calves enjoying those waves. It was so incredible. When they caught a wave, some would ride the waves straight toward shore. Others would suddenly turn to the side, shooting the curl through the translucent water. Several times, we could see a dolphin on its back under another dolphin while shooting the curl, its white belly a vivid contrast to the blue water. We left our topside view to head down the ramp and out to the shore to watch from a different perspective. Their dazzling show continued very close to shore. Finally, Sheryl and I decided to head up the stairs one more time; we had watched the show for so long that we were out of time for our usual workout, (any excuse, right?). We climbed the beastly stairs once more. At the top, catching our breath once again, we took another look. As we watched, another woman struck up a conversation with us. She happened to be a docent at Point Vicente and was quite knowledgeable about both whales and dolphins. Natalie explained that when the male dolphin is 'belly up' under the female, they are positioned for mating. She said the actual act is very fast so it isn't obvious unless you know dolphin behavior. Who knew? Natalie, evidently. Natalie said she spotted something she had never seen before; a calf suckling on its mother as they rode through a wave. How fortunate to have such a show of the natural world just a short walk from my front door!