Humpbacks and fog horns

2019 07-28 SB Channel

The wind and seas we experienced yesterday subsided and the sea surface was very nice. On the other hand, we drove around the Santa Barbara Channel in dense fog all day.

Let’s stop for a moment and shout out to Captain Dave. He drove around yesterday for 8 hours with strong winds and challenging seas, yet pulled-off one of the most epic humpback scenes of the year. Today Dave ran a 4 ½ hour trip with next to zero visibility and still located 2 humpback whales and 1000 long-beaked common dolphins. How does he do it?

We watched the first whale for a considerable amount of quality time as Dave kept it within visual range. It fluked-up regularly and made several very friendly approaches while it did some sub-surface feeding. At this point we were quietly watching the whale and all the dolphins when we heard the loud fog signal from a container cargo ship in the nearby lanes. It was quite and eerie experience within the surrounding dense fog.

Dolphins were around all day. On the way home we encountered a second whale and watched it fluke up, showing its all-white tail.

You never know what Mother Nature has in store. Bob Perry Condor Express, and CondorExpressPhotos.com