People usually aren't able get up-close to, let alone spot, wild oarfish, the elusive, serpent-like, ray-finned ocean creatures that mainly stay in deep open waters.

That's why it was so extraordinary when a group of wildlife enthusiasts, on a kayak trip along the Baja coast in Mexico organized by the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, happened upon two oarfish swimming along the shallows of a local beach.

Reaching up to 56 feet and about 600 pounds, oarfish typically live in temperate and tropical waters, down to 3,000 feet below the surface.

Despite the fact the distribution of oarfish around the world is considerable and wide, the oarfish almost never visit shallower waters, making footage of them nearly impossible to get.

Oarfish typically live in temperate and tropical waters, down to 3,000 feet below the surface. Yet, despite the fishes' wide distribution, oceanographers and other humans rarely glimpse the four known species of oarfish in the deep sea habitat they prefer.

But, according to National Geographic, the huge fish are harmless to humans, as they eat only tiny plankton and don't have teeth.

Most oarfish encounters happen when the when the animals wash up on beaches dead or are stuck in shallows when they are sick.

The condition of the oarfish filmed along the Baja coast was not determined.

Last year, according to a story in Discovery News, a dead 18-foot oarfish was pulled to shore by a snorkeler at Catalina Island, about 22 miles from Los Angeles.

Another 14-foot oarfish corpse was found along a beach north of San Diego a few days later.

The giant oarfish sets the mark as the globe's largest bony fish, according to the Florida Museum of Natural History, although whale sharks and basking sharks beat them out as the world's longest fish.

Oarfish, which have jelly-like meat which has little if any market value, sport silver, scale-less and ribbon-like bodies.

The appearance of oarfish is believed by at least some a sign of an impending earthquake. Myth holds that the appearance of oarfish heralds an earthquake. Indeed, scientists say there might be some scientific basis for that perception.

"Deep-sea fish living near the sea bottom are more sensitive to the movements of active faults than those near the surface of the sea.," Kiyoshi Wadatsumi, director of the non-profit earthquake prediction research organization e-PISCO, told the Japan Times after numerous oarfish came near the Japanese coast in 2010.

The oarfish sighting happened after recent quakes around Los Angeles and only one week after another quake in Chile.