Whale Watch
While much of the country has been shut down because of winter storms, we are loving the weather here in the west. Yesterday was Hunter’s field trip to go whale watching, and it was beautiful! I really wanted to go with him, so I asked a new acquaintance of mine from church to watch the little girls for me. It was a big deal for me to do that because I hate to ask for help or feel like I’m causing an inconvenience– especially with people I don’t know very well. But the girls did well there, and Hunter and I had a very fun day!
It was the perfect day to be on the water. The winds were calm, the sky was clear, and the temperature was in the 60’s. Hunter and his friends had a blast just taking turns with the binoculars that he had brought along. They were all looking for “footprints” in the water– a flat spot that happens when a whale or dolphin surfaces to take a breath. There were several times kids thought they saw something and it would turn out to be a guy in a kayak, wake from another boat, or a bird sitting on the water. After about an hour they announced that there were dolphins at 2 o’clock! There were about 100 of us on the boat, and everyone gathered at the railings to get a look. There were several dolphins swimming along the surface. We watched from a distance for a while, and eventually they came closer to the boat. It was really a great experience to watch them out in the ocean instead of behind glass at an aquarium. The kids were all so excited, but eventually we had to move on and see if we could find a whale. So it was back to eating pretzels and crackers (to keep from getting seasick) and scanning the water. It wasn’t until our time was almost up that we saw the top of a whale in the distance. It was surprising because we were close to the harbor and they usually aren’t in that area. He surfaced briefly twice but was pretty sneaky, so I didn’t get any pictures of him. We felt lucky to have seen both dolphins and the whale, because there have been years that the kids didn’t see either one. If you ever have the opportunity, give whale watching a try!
What an awesome field trip! It sure pays to live on the coast eh? So fun.
That will be sonething Hunter will always remeber, and even better that you got to go and share that great time with him. I still remeber a field trip my class took to San Francisco where my Mom came with me and I loved it! Still a great memory for me, even though we didn’t see any dolphins when we went on the boat to see Alcatraz. I have yet to see a dolphin, and I even lived on Guam, so I am just jealous!
Wow! What a great trip. I’m so glad mom got to go with you. I remember going out on San Fransisco bay with uncle Chris’ class and it was awesome! We caught a sting ray and they brought it on the ship so we could see it up close. No dolphins or whales though. I would love to go whale watching!