An Irresistible Glow: the Hypnosis Of Bioluminescence

Often, it is the bioluminescent phytoplankton that leave the greatest impression on travelers. Lynn Petzold has seen her fair share of bioluminescence during her twenty-three years as a faculty instructor for NOLS, but her most remarkable experience came recently, while leading a two-week kayaking course in the Sea of Cortez in February of 2014.

It was a cool, unusually calm morning toward the end of the trip, at a campsite just north of the fishing town of San Nicolas. Petzold had gotten a preview of the coming light show the night before, as bioluminescent sparks lit up her footsteps in the sand like diamonds. But the full spectacle would come just before dawn.

About half an hour before sunrise, with the mountains of Baja silhouetted against the skyline, the only lights on the sea came from the headlamps of the kayakers—and the water beneath them.

“It was like somebody had poured paint into the water,” Petzold says. She compares the swirls of turquoise-blue light to the curves of a long, billowing skirt: “It moves in a very fluid, beautiful way. It felt like our kayaks and paddles were dancing on the water with the bioluminescence.”

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