Wild Side Specialty Tours

Absolutely loved it! My wife and I had such a wonderful experience on October 30, when we joined the Best of the West cruise. Thanks to Tori and Melissa, our hosting crew, we were able to literally "swim with the dolphins", and we will forever treasure the very fond memory of this special experience! Looking back, it almost feels as if we were daydreaming that morning... Hearing their voices under the water and swimming with them. Amazing! What differentiates Wild Side Specialty's "Best of the West" from the others in my opinion: 1) Staff's passion and love for and knowledge about the marine life, 2) attention to safety 3) willingness to understand and meet guests' expectations and requests, and 4) the small number of passengers ensuring comfort on the boat, as well as flexibility to make "on-the-spot" decisions in changing situations on the sea My wife and I are so happy we chose the Best of the West! The crew was cool and so was the boat! We felt very safe, comfortable and sufficiently educated throughout our cruise time. When I found this tour, I thought to myself "This is it" because it was highly evaluated by nearly all reviewers who actually went on the tour. I immediately emailed them to see if there was room on the morning cruise on October 30, the only day we had available. Shortly after that I received a reply that advised that the boat was full for the day. Bad luck, but no big surprise considering that the Best of the West only takes up to 6 people. Through exchange of a couple emails, Elizabeth at Wild Side promised me that she would let me know if the situation changes. A couple of weeks passed, during which period I did extensive search for dolphin cruises and found nothing promising. Most of them seemed to me too commercial and mass-marketed. About a week before our departure, I was contacted with an opening! contacted them again to test my luck, and I'm so glad I did it. There was an opening for 2 people! All in all, excellent cruise, great people. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!! more

Here's the deal: you get taken on an honest-to-goodness ocean swim with the wild ocean dolphins. You are taken there by marine biologists, who know a ton about all marine animals. They teach you how to behave, explain the behavior of dolphins, and other animals. In short, it's great! Now, you're not guaranteed to see the dolphins - the morning (after they let you snorkel in the ocean for a bit, to make sure everyone is comfortable with the experience) starts with trying to find them. Our boat went to the ve-e-ery tip of the island in the search! Once you find them, you have to hope they are in 'milling behaviou' (i.e. half-asleep, just chilling during the day - they are nocturnal, and hunt at night away from the shore). Well, even if they are in the lazy mood, you have to swim with all your might to keep up :) Our swim ended in 5 minutes - they left us wa-a-ay behind, and I was sure I was a darn good swimmer! But, we also saw ocean turtles nose-to-nose (they are curious about snorkelers), and even a whale shark (this one milled under our sailboat for a bit, guess it was curious too). All in all, a wonderful experience, even if I found out dolphins can outswim me in their sleep! more