Aloha,
I don’t know what the weather has been like where you’re at, but it’s been really challenging here in Waikoloa. We managed to operate one Whale Watch Cruise on Wednesday — our Wake Up with the Whales Cruise. Despite the strong winds which hamper our ability to travel, we really got to see a lot.
As we were leaving the Bay, we saw some splashing to our north, so we (slowly) made our way in that direction. Before we could get to the splashers we were completely surprised when a Humpback tail lobbed just about 20 yards off our stern. Captain Jason said the whale was so close that he could actually hear the water flowing off that whale’s body. Of course he stopped the boat (as well as he could in the wind), and we waited. It wasn’t long before we found our splashers — which turned out to be a competitive pod of three adult Humpbacks. We spent the rest of the cruise watching these three tail lob, pec slap and even breach. We were able to stay about 100 yards from them (though several times they surfaced closer to us). Since they were moving south (downwind) we did too, and we paralleled them until they eventually picked up speed and we had to leave them to make our way back into the bay.
Mahalo,
Claire
Ocean Sports Whale Fact of the Day: Why don’t diving whales have to clear their ears like we do when we’re diving (or changing altitude in an airplane)? It turns out that whales have pretty rigid Eustachian tubes (those are the tiny tubes that run between your throat and your middle ear). So, unlike what happens to most of us who have to force air through our collapsible Eustachian tubes to equalize pressure in our ears, the airflow is basically unimpeded for our cetacean friends!