As the brilliant afternoon sun shined across the sea cliffs of Santa Cruz Island, a mother humpback whale and her calf took turns breaching.
Multitudes of humpback whales and more
There was a moderate breeze blowing in the Santa Barbara Channel today with a little bit of chop here and there as well. It was warm and sunny and there was great above water visibility for spouting whales. El Capitan Dave steered a course for Santa Cruz Island but was side-tracked when second Captain Eric located two humpback whales off More Mesa to the west. So we followed this pair for a while as an hors d’oeuvre for the real show which was to come later near the Island. About 500 or so long beaked common dolphins were scattered throughout the area and at one point we were watching a nursery pod with lots of nice, tiny animals swimming with their mothers. Next, we were off to Santa Cruz.
Across the shipping lanes and near the Island the same mother lode of humpback #whales was located exactly where we left them yesterday. There were, once again, more spouts than anyone could keep track of strung out on a line parallel to the Island as the Condor Express ran west to east, downhill, to minimize the effects of wind and sea. A very conservative and legitimate count of humpback whales watched closely might fall into the area of 14 or so, but there were a multitude more that we could not possibly get close to within our time frame, Along the face of the Island the humpbacks were mixed in with a dispersed pod of a dozen or two Risso’s dolphins. After a brief but enjoyable Island tour along the sea cliffs, we headed home.
Not long after we got on our homeward course heading the Crew located a pair of breaching humpbacks in the distance. We slowly approached and found a mother and calf pair that had been breaching, both of them, one after the other. The breaching was followed by some mighty pectoral fin slapping and all of this was marvelous to see with the breeze and blue water and sun. There were a few extra tall spouts in the distance…probably blue whales….but not confirmed.
You never know what Mother Nature has in store. Bob Perry Condor Express
I’ll post the photos from today’s trip before Monday night.