Killer whales! (And more; in fog)

Images: passengers on the bow of the Condor Express get exceptional views of a friendly killer whale. And our deckhand Isabel took a nice shot of Hercules breaching in the fog. Thanks Isabel!

2026 03–29 SB Channel

9A and 12; a pair of trips left the docks in thick fog. Captain Eddy reported that, at times, especially on the morning trip, one could barely see the bow. When we were up to the far W, in the afternoon, things opened up which greatly helped our enjoyment of the wildlife. Exceptional Santa Barbara cobalt blue water clarity continues to prevail. Sightings: 5 coastal bottlenose dolphins, 30 common dolphins, 5 Dall’s porpoises, and… on the 12N trip…an estimated 15 killer whales (we closely watched 11).

In the morning, the dense fog limited our ability to find and follow wildlife. We encountered 5 bottlenose dolphins outside the harbor and tracked them into the east beach anchorage. We turned back up the coast and, off of the Mesa, had 10 common dolphins.

On the afternoon trip, we received a tip from our friend Devin regarding killer whales far to W, and SW of platform Holly. Again, navigating thick fog, we got quick looks at Dall’s porpoises close to Holly, and then, on the return trip to the Harbor, we drove by a pod of about 20 common dolphins.

But, as you might expect, we spent most of this adventure with the killer whales. As previously mentioned, the lateral visibility improved quite a bit when we were up to the W. Coordinating our sightings information with Devin, there were an estimated 15 killer whale individuals. There was one large male which has been identified as CA 137, and named Hercules, according to Alisa Schulman-Janiger of the California Killer Whale Project. I will edit this report as more information arrives. NOTE: as promised, I have a few more KW IDs from Alisa. See below.

The most interesting parts of this encounter were the marvelous behaviors we witnessed. In addition to Hercules, there appeared to be a much younger male as determined by the fact that he was busy mating with a female for quite a long period of time right off the bow of the Condor Express. I think we’re gonna have to have passenger release forms and limit these cruises to 18 and older!  Yikes!

There was a lot of breaching. The group included at least 3 very small calves and they were breaching also! We saw upside-down swimming close to the boat, there were countless close approaches and kw’s swimming underneath us… lots of opportunities for selfies.

You never know what mother nature has in store.

Bob Perry

condorexpressphotos.com

NOTE: ID updates so far (2026 03-30; 13:00)

CA122B, CA122B2, CA122B3, CA49C "Venus", CA122D