Sometimes it is hard to tell what is more important in a whale watching tour, the animals, the weather, or the people. For those who have been working on the field for some time –and agreeing with me– you will tell that people is, ultimately what decides if the experience is good or great. Today we scored triple: the sightings were amazing, the weather was nice, and the customers were next level.
We started our tour with the regular briefing that we do before the activity. We received information from the lookouts, and we left to the whales.
The first sighting was a large baleen whale, but it wasn’t until we had seen it 2-3 times that we could identify it as a Blue Whale. When the confirmation was done, people reaction was unforgettable. A lady started to cry of happiness. We got a very good view of the animal, and we could hear it blowing several times.
The whale was foraging and we decided to leave it alone after 30 minutes. Since there was another one in the area we moved towards the second whale: another Blue Whale! Even bigger than the first one. Same behavior, difficult to follow, and we left too after a few sightings.
The lookout spotted a third whale and –of course– we moved again. But along the way we found a playful pod of about 40 Common Dolphins. We stayed 5 minutes with them until we saw a huge blow emerging far away, and yes, we went to see the “third whale”.
The surprise was that instead of one single whale, we found a mum-calf pair of Fin Whales. We saw it twice and they disappeared. Luckily, a third Fin Whale was near enough for us to spot it: the third fin Whale.
Time arrived and we had to start our way back. But after 15 minutes, the second blue whale was there again, and we could see it once, but when leaving, it raised its tail and dived towards the deep blue.
No need to say that feeling onboard were exploding. People clapping, laughing, smiling. Grateful to the animals, grateful to the ocean, grateful to nature. And we were grateful as well, for all these things, and for being able to help to provide them.
– Maria Serra from Azores Experiences
Leave a Reply