🐋 Epic day in the water with “Chalkboard”!! (Happywhale ID: HW-MN0501562)

“I think it should come up somewhere over there,” I said to @ChelseaRhane (while pointing toward our left side) ⁠

😲Suddenly we hear the loud humpback spout 🐳15 yards behind us. We were already in idle since we were stopped to grab someone’s trashed balloon, but I switched our engine off and grabbed my @GoPro to capture this.

The whale slowly drifted completely under our boat, only 6-10′ below and just lingered there. Maybe he was racing me to the balloon and wanted me to throw it again to play. ⁠ ⁠Notice the excessive amount of marks from his dorsal down to his tail. It looks to me like the marks that would be made from an entanglement, like a ghost net. ⁠This humpback was also playing with the kelp, or just using it to scratch its back. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

Watch this encounter here

-Blake