Day 73 - A Day at Sea

What a day, and where to start with it all? The beginning probably.

We were up at the crack of dawn, well before then even, and made the short 15 minute journey to the whale watching place. Here we checked in and then had time to watch the sunrise outside before it was time for our trip briefing. Inside we were given all the spiel about safety and also reminded that we wouldn’t be guaranteed to see a whale though they do have a 95% success rate. We then got on a bus to take us on the short trip to South Bay where we all could then get on board the boat.

We made our way out to the deeper waters, all the while being given information from one of the crew members, where we stopped briefly to allow the skipper to listen for the whale call – using a special device not just his ears alone! He heard one and made a beeline towards it, making a few more stops to check for changes in direction. He actually picked up two calls and so made for the closest one first where the boat then stopped… and we all watched… and watched. It wasn’t long though before we caught a glimpse of the whale spraying out the carbon dioxide, giving away its location so we could get the 15 metres, we were allowed, from it. Most of us went to the top deck of the small boat to watch the huge sperm whale at the surface knowing we only had about 7-15 minutes before it would dive back down, not re-surfacing for another 50 or so minutes. Our informative guide was good and told us all when to get our cameras ready for the big dive. The dive is pretty impressive, giving that famous tale-out-of-water shot you see. After witnessing this there really was no need to hang around as we’d have a long wait to see this fella again and so we moved on to try and catch the second one. We actually managed to get to it whilst it was still at the surface and so went to the top deck for better viewing. This sperm whale was much bigger than the first and we got almost as much time with this one as with number one. Once he’d disappeared the skipper decided to move on as we’d seen two whales, the aim for the trips, and he wanted us to see some other wildlife… though this was a whale watching trip?!

We headed to a couple of large rocks where we found a massive colony of fur seals along with lots of types of birds including: spotted shags, seagulls, albatrosses and turns. We bobbed around these rocks and took snaps before heading over to one last spot – a patch with dolphins.

We got to see our first dolphins of the day here and there were a fair few about, all of them fishing for their breakfast it would seem. This did make the two of us feel like we may be about to waste our money on the 2^nd boat trip of the day – the dolphin encounter trip.

Back on dry land we both chatted about how good this trip had been and how difficult it would be to top it. We really were regretting having booked the dolphin encounter now, though it would be nice to watch the dolphins again we supposed.

After lunch by the sea, in the sun, we made another short drive down the road to the dolphin encounter place. We checked in here too and had a few minutes to kill before we needed to get kitted up.

Once called, we went to a room where the, very few, “swimmers” were gathered and were given our snorkelling gear. When kitted out in our sexy attire we went to a large room where we joined the “watchers” of the group who were all sat ready to watch our second briefing of the day. A similar DVD was played and then we were taken by bus to the same harbour as for the whale watching trip, where we boarded our boat.

Again the sun was shining brightly and the waters had calmed a bit since this morning’s trip which was very welcome. We travelled for about 20 minutes before slowing, though we had to wait for the captain to give the go ahead before the “swimmers” could hop off the rear of the boat. We’ve both snorkelled before though it took us a minute or two to get a hang of just breathing through our mouths and longer still to try not to smile so much so as not to create holes for water to get into our masks; a challenge made very difficult by what we were about to see. There were lots of dusky dolphins around us and as we swam towards them we were greeted by the playful creatures regardless of whether or not we made weird noises - something which the guide had told us would help attract them. We had rented a small, digital, underwater camera to use and took it in turns to mess around with this – a task very difficult to begin with due to the long delay with the snaps and the small number of dolphins in view at any one time under the water. This all changed as we made further stops with the boat, as we got slightly better with the camera and the number of dolphins began to increase. The numbers soon dwarfed the ones we’d seen this morning, with us eventually swimming, not once but twice, with a pod of more than 150 wild dolphins. There were so many and they were everywhere; the “watchers” on the boat were getting good views of them all doing their acrobatics and jumps, whilst we in the water were being swarmed by them. Danny managed to get one circling around with him over and over, whilst Corrie managed to get close enough to see a lone, inquisitive fur seal under the water being entertained by a couple of the showboating dolphins. We got to spend quite a long time in the water on the last two swims and this made it all the more fun, and all the more sad when it was finally time to get back on the boat. We got in the water a total of five times on this outing and they were all worth the plunge into the chilly depths.

After the fifth and last swim we got back on the boat, hosed down with some warm water and had hot chocolate and cookies whilst we got changed into our dry clothes.

                                    

We moved on so that we could follow the dolphins some more; with them easily matching the speed of the boat and elegantly diving out, then back into the sea alongside us. There were the odd few that appeared to be addicted to launching themselves out of the water and then splashing back down on their sides time after time – this amused everyone and only seemed to increase the number of dolphins doing it! During this journey we also saw quite a few more turns, giant petrels, wandering and royal albatrosses; including one great albatross, so called due to its wingspan exceeding 3 metres – a feature that it lazily demonstrated as it sat bobbing along on the waves. It was soon time to head back and we had clearly timed the day’s trips superbly as, during the trip back to the jetty, a very fast moving and thick mist completely engulfed the coast and removed any trace of the dolphins and other wildlife – almost as if we were all now waking up from a great big dream and returning to real world.

We’d handed our gear back in and went to pick up our camera picture CD – which we won’t know if it works until we make it back round to Paul and Judy’s house in a couple of weeks’ time. We’re fairly confident there’s at least a few good pics and videos on there, though the majority can probably just be deleted. NB - We have done this now!

The rest of the evening was spent: getting food for tea, making tea, relaxing, showering, writing the blog etc and reading just before bed.

This day has easily been one of the very best from our travels so far, with us definitely getting our money’s worth on both trips – and living one of many people’s bucket list items: to swim with dolphins. What a day!

 A sperm whale diving

 Some of the dolphins