Print Only 100 yards from a nature center and down a sandy trail to the Pacific, I spotted a telltale heart-shaped spout — a misty exhalation of a California gray whale on her northern migration — rising from the ocean. Sunlight glinting off the animal’s back was a sparkling sign that some of the best whale watching can occur from a surprising place: land. This visit last February to Dana Point Preserve, about an hour’s drive north of San Diego, was my fourth stop along the Whale Trail, a collection of coastal sites stretching 1,500 miles from Southern California to British Columbia. These separate and distinct paths and viewpoints are ideal vantages for learning about whales, dolphins and other marine mammals, some that linger tantalizingly close to shore.