As the boat was out in the water, our naturalist aboard spotted a spout. 10 minutes later, I saw it as well and recognized it as a Grey Whale by the heart-shaped spout.
It was a young individual that was hanging up enough near the surface that you could see it just under the water. When it dived, our attention was diverted by a California Sea Lion swimming around, but we were then surprised as the whale breached.
It would continue to breach for at least another 10 times! This was such an energetic individual.
We left the whale to continue its migration towards Baja California and ran into a small pod of Pacific White-sided Dolphins on our way back to the harbor. It had been a while since I had seen a Grey Whale in the wild, and it was an amazing encounter.
-Patrick
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