Aloha,
I know I’ve said this before, but you don’t have to be on a dedicated Whale Watch Cruise to get to see Humpbacks (especially this time of year). Guests on one of our Private Snorkel Cruises on Friday saw at least 15 different Humpbacks during their 3 hour cruise. Captain Will reported that as he was heading to and from the snorkel site, Humpbacks just wouldn’t leave the boat alone. Multiple times, they surfaced around 100 yards away, and everyone got to see multiple fluke and pec slaps, and lots of rolling around at the surface. At least 6 different times, different whales between 300 and 400 yards breached fully out of the water.
Guests on Saturday’s Wake Up with the Whales Cruise spent a good 45 minutes with a competitive pod of 4 whales. These whales kept circling our boat (maybe the one in front — presumably the female — was using us to shake those guys who were chasing her, and if that was the case, we didn’t mind being used at all). Several times, they surfaced within about 25 feet of our idling boat, and we got to see a lot of head lunges, body slams, pec slaps, and even a whale surfacing with a partially open mouth. While all that action was going on around us, we deployed the hydrophone and got to listen to this pod while they were underwater — they made a lot of very low grumbling sounds. Several times they passed under the boat, and we could even see them on our depth finder (see the photo above).
Guests on Saturday’s Late Morning Whale Watch saw lots and lots of pods of two Humpbacks. Most were definitely adults (but a Mom/calf pod did find us towards the end of the cruise). A couple of times we were surprised when a Humpback duo surfaced simultaneously about 75 yards from us, and we could hardly believe our eyes when one of these duos started swimming right at our idling boat before sounding and disappearing from sight.
Finally, sticking with the theme that we see Humpbacks at all times of the day, guests on Saturday’s Sunset Cruise spent considerable time with a very active competitive pod of 5 Humpbacks. At one point we were all watching them when one of those whales breached less than 100 yards from our boat. You can see it for yourself on our Instagram Page. Crazy.
Mahalo,
Claire
Ocean Sports Whale Fact of the Day: We know Humpbacks are big animals, but it’s not until we have a CLOSE ENCOUNTER (like the ones we had on Saturday) that we really appreciate how big they are. But Humpbacks are only the 5th largest of the great whales — Blue whales, Finbacks, Grays, and Right Whales (including Bowheads) are all longer (on average)– and if you want to count the toothed whales in the list, male Sperm Whales are longer too.