Tourists in California were treated to a rare spectacle when 1,000 dolphins swam alongside their boat in a “stampede” last week.

The army of dolphins were spotted off Dana Point in Orange County on a boat organized by a local whale-watching group.

“They are so graceful even in the frenzied behavior and we are so amazed to see them right off our coast,” noted the Dana Point Whale Watching group, which posted a video of the event on their Instagram. “This behavior is known as the Dolphin Stampede, we were the first location to coin the phrase.”

Dolphins normally travel in groups or “pods” of under 200, although large-scale pods occur in places where there is a great deal of food, according to a report in the San Francisco Chronicle.