Toby and I stayed with friends from the university (where I work and where Praj used to work), Ben and Mark, on Friday night and we drove up to Hervey Bay together early on Saturday morning where we met up with Karl, also from the university, and eventually Tracy and Praj, their parents, and a whole bunch of friends they went to uni with in Toowoomba.
Without putting too fine a point on it the weather was bloody perfect. We boarded at 10am for a 6 hour cruise and by about midday had seen the best of what the day had to offer. Toby and I had a fantastic whale-watching experience a couple of years ago with my mam and dad and were quite prepared to be disappointed but we were far from it. Off in the distance we could see lots of splashing around and as we approached we found that it was a group of three whales: a mother and her calf with an escort to help them defend themselves whilst feeding. The calf was only a couple of months old and was playing around slapping its tail on the water over and over again. In adult whales this is often interpreted as a threat signal but with the baby I think it was just having fun. We stopped the obligatory 300 metres from the group and the calf became curious and began lunging its head out of the water to have a peak at us, not the graceful spy-hop of an older whale positioning itself vertically with its eye peaking out to have a good look, but an energetic jumping around and splashing back down. When the people on the boat cheered and clapped the baby became even more enthused and just kept doing it over and over again, giving us a couple of attempts at breaches too. It went on for quite some time and is one of the most spectacular sights I have ever seen.
Eventually the mother tried to take the calf away to calm it down and as they left it continued jumping around and lunging its head out of the water until soon they were back with us. They eventually left when another boat turned up and they decided to go over to say hello to them.
We didn't see much for a while after that but that didn't matter as we were being well fed and watered on the boat. They even provided champagne for the party. During lunch someone pointed out a turtle bobbing around on the surface of the water but when I looked at it, it seemed a little deformed and in fact, didn't look much like a turtle at all, except for the whole bobbing-around-on-the-surface-of-the-water thing. A closer look revealed that we were, in fact, witnessing some turtle loving. It's a beautiful thing. Later on we saw another group or two of whales and a couple of solo males, who greeted us in various ways, from a pectoral slap or wave, to a tail slap, a graceful dive and a magnificent breach. They really are beautiful, graceful, curious, friendly creatures. We saw a few dolphins too but, as much as I love dolphins, they seem to fade into the background when whales are around. I think possibly because they are used to humans.
On the way back to the marina we had a couple of bow-riding dolphins which is just beautiful to see. However, the captain slowed down for everyone to have a look and take some pictures and the dolphins got bored and went on their way. By this time, Praj and Tracy's young friends had been drinking for almost 6 hours and were providing us with more than enough entertainment.
After a swim and a rest we went out for a lovely meal at The Boat Club, provided by Praj and Tracy's parents. We stayed that night at The Outrigger which was brilliant because they gave us a free bottle of red wine!
From all the many photos of sea and white water I managed to find some worth putting on my photo blog. Check them out at: http://snapper.cvsdude.com/gallery/linsb/v/prajTracyWhaleWatch/
Here's a short no-frills movie clip straight from the camera - I haven't had any time for that fancy-pants video editing thing:
1 comment:
What a fabulous day you had - I'm sooo jealous! I went whale watching from Sydney & it was almost like going out in white water - it was rough, cold, wet and wild! we caught a brief glimpse of a mum & baby & that was it ... I'm off to Hervey Bay next time!!
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