Aloha,
As soon as we left the Bay for Tuesday’s Wake up with the Whales Cruise, we were challenged by our favorite dilemma — what do we go see first? We caught a glimpse of some blows from Mom and calf just south of us, but we also saw a pod of Spinner Dolphins. So we mentally marked the location of the Humpbacks and spent some time with the very active dolphins. The dolphins did their leaping, spinning, twirling thing for awhile all around us, and some of them rode our bow wake.
After they moved on, we headed over to Mom and Baby. We watched this pair for a couple of cycles of spouting and sounding, and then some spouts from a pod of two larger whales caught our attention. So we left Mom and her calf, and headed over to watch these bigger whales splash around a bit at the surface for awhile. After they sounded, they just disappeared on us — we never saw them surface again. So we continued on and found another Mom/baby pod (or maybe it was the same one we had been watching before) and spent some more time watching them as they surfaced and lazily spouted for a few more cycles.
After they moved on, we headed over to Mom and Baby. We watched this pair for a couple of cycles of spouting and sounding, and then some spouts from a pod of two larger whales caught our attention. So we left Mom and her calf, and headed over to watch these bigger whales splash around a bit at the surface for awhile. After they sounded, they just disappeared on us — we never saw them surface again. So we continued on and found another Mom/baby pod (or maybe it was the same one we had been watching before) and spent some more time watching them as they surfaced and lazily spouted for a few more cycles.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Though no one is really sure how Humpback Whales are able to navigate so accurately through the open ocean to find Hawaii, research conducted on the migratory paths of a few South Atlantic and a few South Pacific Humpbacks between 2003 and 2007 showed that regardless of currents on the surface, storms, and obstacles, the humpbacks never deviated more than about 5 degrees from their straight-line migratory paths. Researchers don’t think the whales are relying solely on the earth’s magnetic fields for navigation, since magnetism varies too widely to explain the straight paths the whales swim. They also don’t think the whales are finding their way by just using the sun (like many birds do) because the ocean wouldn’t provide an adequate frame of reference. It’s possible the whales rely on both those methods, combined with celestial markers. Or are they navigating by following the sounds of each other’s voices? Researchers are still working hard to decipher the mystery.