June 14-15, 2025

We got off to a late start on Saturday after having to cancel our morning trip due to unfavorable weather. Conditions nicened up enough for our afternoon trip however, so off we went. Recent trips have been requiring us to travel a loooooong ways from home before we start seeing whales, but that changed pretty quickly as we passed through the Isles of Shoals and wasted no time finding our first whale, Pinball the humpback!

Pinball diving

We hung out with Pinball for a few surfacing's before deciding press on out towards where we had been having luck with whales recently. After making the journey to where we had been originally anticipating our sightings to begin, a few began to show themselves. We were able to spend time with two more humpbacks, Spika and Periscope. 

Humpback whale traveling

Periscope Diving

These whales were definitely doing a lot of traveling, giving us a few sparse looks before we finally had to make our final turn back towards Rye.

Sunday morning began with us making our way back out to Saturday's stomping grounds. The day's forecast called for clouds to loom over us all day, but we were pleasantly surprised that this wasn't the case at all! The sun shining down allowed us to catch looks at the HUNDREDS of Lion's Mane Jellyfish that were floating near the surface as we traveled along. After making our way out to the ledge, we started with the same whale as we did on Saturday afternoon, Pinball! Except this time she was 15 miles away from where we had seen her yesterday. 

Lion's Mane Jellyfish

Humpback whale diving

While watching Pinball, we saw another distant blow that we eventually made our way out towards, which turned out to be a fin whale! Our sightings of these whales has been far less frequent than last June, so a very welcome surprise.

Fin whale diving

 After spending time with the fin whale, we could see two more whales off in the distance, so we moved to investigate. Those distant blows turned out to be more humpback whales. We were able to identify those whales as Dross and Tripod. All of these whales were on the move, so we would have to wait and see if they would make an appearance later in the afternoon.

Saturday afternoon took a while to get started. We spent a good chunk of time making our way out towards where we had luck in the morning, but alas, to no avail. We changed directions and began searching elsewhere, and it didn't take long for us to find a whale once we did. We once again happened upon a familiar fluke...

Pinball diving

Pinball was definitely moving with a purpose this afternoon, and that purpose was feeding! Practically every time she surfaced it was while she was actively feeding or filtering out saltwater from a subsurface lunge. 

Pinball (Vertical)

Pinball (Horizontal)

All good things must come to an end however, and unfortunately for us, we were running out of time. We said our goodbyes to Pinball and made our way back towards home with the wind at our backs and the sun shining bright!