Dolphins and Whales et al, Oh My!

Greetings from woofers who has been hiding out for a while now!

I will keep in brief for this new post as I am using my iPhone as a ‘hotspot’ for internet use at home right now. As I have to move my new travel trailer in a week, haven’t bothered to have wifi installed.

During the last few weeks of work in San Diego, I went on two short nearshore whale-watching trips out of Dana Point. The Ocean Institute has such simple 2-hour trips to go on, they have become a staple of end-of-season things to do. No Blue Whales were sighted on either trip, but we did see what the captain said was a rare Bryde’s whale on the first trip. It looked like a Fin whale, I suppose, to me – having seen one last year. We mainly just saw its blow and back a few times. The common dolphins were also great fun to see. I am always trying to get interesting photos of them – such as underwater, just surfacing, pairs of mom’s and their calves, jumping dolphins, and behaviors like bow-riding or wake-surfing. Managed to get a little of each on the two trips off Dana Point. Season 4 at USGS ended August 5th, and I drove up eastern Sierra to enjoy the scenery and saw no need to rush up I-5 back to Davis. After a few days in the Davis heat – 90s and 100s F – I drove down to Carmel-by-the-sea and was fortunate to stay at the cousin’s cottage for 3 nights! Down in the Monterey area, things were cool, calm, and comfortable. I went on two trips out of Dana Point with Sanctuary Cruises, one solo and one with cousin’s….both trips were pretty fruitful. I think we ran into the same group of 5-6 Humpback whales each trip. Great fun to see the whales (last year supposedly was a super year for whales in the Bay….that’s what prompted me to check out Moss Landing Point trips this year – the sightings from last year’s trips looked amazing!). From the Moss Landing harbor, we began seeing California Sea-otters, California Sea-lions, and harbor seals right away. I love seeing the Sea-otters (a few of these photos here are also from Point Lobos – a great place to explore the coast – good place to spot seals and otters). Not too far off-shore from Moss Landing, we ran into groups of whales, some mola-mola (Ocean Sunfish), more sea-lions, and 1000s and 1000s of Sooty Shearwaters. The coolest sight for me was the Humpback surfacing and cruising through a raft of shearwaters. Neat. Had a few other pelagic birds such as – Rhinoceros Auklet, Common Murre groups/pairs, Pink-footed shearwaters….One of the bizarre sightings for me was seeing a Sea-otter eating a cormorant (see photo with pink flesh and visible head of cormorant). Never heard of that before and saw it in the harbor on the 2nd trip. The sea/bay was calm both days, with fog or overcast skies mostly – good cool weather and decent for photography. These trips were just as fun as the Dana Point trips as they are 2-4 hr long trips, easy to get to, and in the right places to usually see some sort of good marine/ocean activity. The almost guaranteed common dolphins of Dana Point are a small bonus to those trips. I give many thanks to the Glickman/Kasper-Glickman consortium for making my stay so nice in Carmel. Fortunate timing and fun to be with this family…looking forward to more adventures this Fall-Winter!!! Enjoy.