A whale of a date

Waiting for the boys

The plan at the start of the day was to meet in Middle Cove to see if the iceberg that was grounded there, was still there.  It wasn't but we were not one bit disappointed.  We were in store for some close encounters with whales.

Here they come

Clyde and Tobias joined Dean and myself who had paddled at our leisure towards Motion.  The water was quite active, most waves between 1 and 1.5 meters.  It told us we were on the sea.

A seal

We spotted some plumes from whales breaching in Torbay and made our way over there.  En route, I happened upon a seal that didn't realize I had paddled stealthily up to it.  Hard to see but trust me, its there in the middle of the picture, near the horizon.

 Flukes

There were whale spouts all over the place.  Difficult to say how many were feeding but my guess was between 6 and 10.  The spouts were the first hints they were about.  The sound of the whale clearing its blowhole was a sign they were close.

Waiting

There were lots of gulls overhead and I suspected where they were, so were the whales.  We just floated about hoping the whales would pass by close to our position.  It wasn't long before ...

Another diving

... we heard another woosh and another surfaced before diving back into the depths.  I was close to numerous whales, some coming right towards me, but the active water made them difficult to capture with the camera.  They didn't stay long on the surface as they were busy feeding and once on the surface the wave crests often got in the way.  One dove right in front of me before I could get the camera ready but ...

I see you

... as I looked down into the water under my boat I saw the white flippers of the humpback, plunged the camera into the water and hoped.

Cat and mouse

Another set of flukes racing away.

 Crossing

We saw a couple of plumes across the bay near the Rocky Hills in Outer Cove so we went to have a look.  When we got there they had disappeared.

Oh well, we had a very good first day of whale watching.  I've been lucky to have paddled close to whales numerous times but no matter how often it happens its always an awestruck moment.

We paddled to Torbay Point where it got gnarly before paddling back to Middle Cove, stopping in Outer Cove for lunch.  Those pictures for a later day.

Here's a link to Dean's blog with a few other shots of the whales today.