Pages

Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Wednesday, September 2

The beautiful conditions and whale sightings we have been privy to experience recently once again continued today. We know the whales and weather are both completely out of our control so we are certainly not becoming complacent regarding our recent trips. We once again managed to come across 4 different types of whales, another grand slam of whale sightings, today. In total, we had 2 Ocean sunfish, 7 Minke whales, 4 Fin whales, two pods of Atlantic white-sided dolphins (a small group consisting of 8-10 whales and then a larger group of ~65) and 5 Humpback whales. We started the day with an Ocean sunfish while we waited for a Fin whale to resurface.
Ocean sunfish swimming in towards us!
This whale was on the move so instead we decided to press further offshore. We then began bouncing from whale sighting to whale sighting for whales continued to pop up in all directions around us. We saw Humpback whale #0050 moving through the area, saw another pair of Humpback whales moving in towards us while at the same time saw a small pod of Atlantic white-sided dolphins doing the same.
Humpback whale #0050

One of the small group of dolphins we saw moving towards the boat
We checked out these toothed-whales when suddenly a Fin whale suddenly appeared associated with these dolphins. Awesome!
Fin whale
Eventually we made our way to our pair of Humpback whales. It was Highlighter and Mogul on the move together.
First pair of Humpback whales seen today: Highlighter and Mogul
With some nice time spent with this pair of whales we headed further offshore. Two other Humpback whales were seen; another pair. This time it was Patches and Nike swimming through the water together.
Nike and Patches
We spent time with this pair and as we did so saw a few different seals too. Many of these seals were sleeping!
Sleeping harbor seal
As we wrapped up our time offshore we saw more splashing. Another group of Atlantic white-sided dolphins were passing by. We headed that way, watched them as they traveled along, and then once again suddenly had another Fin whale appear close by with a second one out in the distance! Whales continue to pop up and we most certainly hope they continue to spend time in our small section of the open ocean.
Larger group of Atlantic white-sided dolphins we ended our trip with today
Dolphin on the move

No comments:

Post a Comment