Public interest in whale watching grew dramatically in the early 1970s as the ″Save the Whales″ movement brought global attention to the plight of these animals. Oceanic Society ran its first whale watching trip to the Farallon Islands in 1975 aboard a former Coast Guard Cutter, M/V Alert, and soon began to offer regular whale watching trips out of Sausalito, Pillar Point, and Bodega Bay, California, and eventually to Baja California out of San Diego.[12] Oceanic Society continues to offer whale watching in the San Francisco Bay Area, with two separate whale watching seasons: 1) Gray whale watching from January through May, and 2) Farallon Islands whale watching from May through November.[13]