Spouting Humpback
Guests joining us on our Thursday Mid-Morning Whale Watch Cruise didn’t have to travel far to see our first Humpback of the day. We caught sight of him as we were leaving the bay, almost before Captain Sam could complete his safety briefing.
This whale was traveling solo, and he was traveling at a fairly good clip to the south. We really weren’t sure if he had a destination in mind, as the entire time we paralleled and watched him, it didn’t appear that he was meeting up with any other Humpbacks (at least none that we could see).
After cruising with our loner for about 40 minutes, we realized that we had better turn the boat so we could get back to the bay before our cruise time was up. It wasn’t until we got to the entrance of Anaeho’omalu Bay that we saw our next 2 Humpbacks. These two were definitely adults (either 2 males hanging out together, or a male/female duo). We got a good look at their huge spouts, and a good look at their dorsal fins but unfortunately we had to get back to the mooring, so we couldn’t spend a substantial amount of time with them.
There was also a whale breaching much further out to sea during our cruise, but only Captain Sam and our naturalist Scott happened to be looking at the right place and at the right time to see the splashes created by this whale.
Mahalo,
Claire
Ocean Sports Whale Fact of the Day: When a Humpback spouts, he’s exhaling in a half of a second, 90% of the volume of air in his lungs. It’s enough air in one blow to fill up the interior of a stretch limousine. In case you’re curious, when an average size human adult exhales, he takes 3 times as long to exhale just 15% of the volume of air in his lungs — and an adult human exhalation wouldn’t even fill up a Smart Car — it’s only enough air to fill up a lunch bag.