[CINC] Condor, today.

[Scott Cuzzo]

Sightings –

7-10+ blue whales
1 humpback mother + one calf
two clusters of common dolphin
sea lions (which seem to get no respect!)
one glorious day

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We found a small pod of common dolphin shortly after leaving the  
harbor, closer to shore than as is most common.  Everyone loves to  
see these guys so it was nice to start quickly with the sightings.

We got close to the west end of SCI and no spouts!  We had to head  
further west, much further along SRI than usual to find our first  
spouts.  We were seeing krill at the surface, despite the sun, which  
I though usually triggered them to head deeper.  Before seeing our  
first spout we found another group of commons in a decent-sized  
feeding frenzy with birds and sea lions in the mix.  After leaving  
these dolphins we found spouts on the horizon.  First one blue whale,  
then two more popped up, then a third charged over, then a fourth and  
fifth came charging over.  Some seemed to have rung the dinner bell!   
There was some lunge feeding seen, but no really great views of this  
close to the boat, though there were some close approaches.  More  
whales kept showing up.  Everyone got to see lots of blue whales!!!   
And there were spouts all over the horizon in all directions.  Hard  
to say exactly how many whales were there.

Towards the end of our time with these whales I caught a glimpse of a  
black whale dorsal area.  Humpbacks!  Indeed, we had a mother and  
calf that had come to join the blue whale congregation!  We got  
pretty good views of mom and baby as they stayed near the surface.

We then left the whales for dip into painted cave.

And yes there were sea lions along the way.  Who doesn't love a sea  
lion???   Sadly they seem to be in ranking somewhere with your basic  
sea gull.  :(

Fun to be on the Condor as the passengers always range from all over  
the place!  I love when I walk up to some folks and start  
talking...for a while...only to realize they don't speak English!  No  
matter...watching whales seems to some sort of universal wordless  
language.

Sally Eagle was on photo ID doing her best to try to keep all the  
whales straight!!!  Not easy to do today!

Regards,

Scott Cuzzo
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