Today was a beautiful day on the water, a welcome change from our last public trip on Friday when the ocean was choppy and confused, and we couldn’t find a whale. Trips without whales happen, but this was our first “skunk” of the season. Fortunately, today, we were back on track with a variety of sightings!
We passed by two pods of harbor porpoises before finding a
small group of Atlantic white-sided dolphins! Although many use the terms
porpoise and dolphin interchangeably, they are different animals. One of the biggest
differences between harbor porpoises and Atlantic white-sided dolphins is their
curiosity for boats. Harbor porpoises want nothing to do with us, while the AWS
dolphins are often curious and will come close to boats. Today’s calm seas were
perfect for viewing these animals as they swam around the boat.
Next, we found an ocean sunfish that stayed at the surface long enough for all of our guests to see.
After a couple of hours of searching, we finally found a large whale. And large it was! Fin whales are the 2nd largest species of whale in the world, and we found multiple throughout the trip! Our first two fin whales were quite cooperative, allowing us to get great looks as they took many breaths at the surface.
A couple more fin whales were spotted in that area but they were a little less cooperative. As we headed for home, some of got a quick look at a grey seal, but then a large basking shark showed us how magnificent they are! Basking sharks are the 2nd largest species of shark in the world and although this one wasn’t the largest, it was still pretty big- maybe 20 feet in length!
As we continued back to the harbor, we passed by several more distant blows before stopping on one that was close to our course home.
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