A Whale of a Time

Alan and I got our first visitors to California this week when his parents came to town. It’s a welcome visit for several reasons: 1) It’s lovely to have people besides Marti to talk to and 2) We get to play host and tour guide, which means seeing our favorite sites and eating at our favorite spots while exploring new places and having adventures with the W clan.

Lar and Shar got to town on Saturday so we had a low-key meal at our favorite pizza joint. We had to make it an early night because on Sunday we had to get up at 5:30 so we could leave for Monterey to catch our whale-watching adventure. Now, I must preface this entry by saying that there is no way, even with my immense talent for writing and description (ha), that I can do justice to the awesomeness of the whales we saw. If you’re ever lucky enough to get to go on a whale-watching trip, I sincerely hope that you are as fortunate as we were.


Doped up on Dramamine and bundled up in a hooded sweatshirt and a jacket, we ventured out on to the open sea. I popped in my minty gum from the get-go to stave off any gnarly sea-sick taste that might occur. I took the advice of a wise sage to hold on to the rails, or bench, to tell my brain that I was OK. I don’t know if it was the Dramamine, the mint, the advice, or divine intervention, but I managed to avoid feeling sick—although I can’t say the same for others on board.

I’m going to say it was divine intervention, though. And here’s why. We cruised out onto the water for what seemed like an hour. At the beginning you’re looking out for otters and sea lions, basically any form of life you can get your eyes on. But after our biologist on board announced that she thought she saw whale spouts a mile and a half up ahead, I pretty much gave up hope that I would see anything on my own. When we reached the whales, we had to wait for them to surface. What happens is that they come up, stay near the surface to take about 5 or 6 breaths, and then dive back down for food for several minutes. They turned out to be humpback whales—and there were two of them. Since they move fairly slowly, it’s easy for the boat to stay with them. When they’re diving, you’re waiting anxiously for them to resurface again to get another glimpse. It was amazing. Then, it got even better.

On about the fifth time they resurfaced, the first whale to surface nearly took out our boat. Whether he was showing off or what, we’ll never know. I missed the action, but I turned and saw a huge splash, literally feet from the back of our boat. They were back up. Alan and I went to the other side of the boat. A couple of seconds later, the other came up and splashed out of the water—a semi-breach. Then, moments later, the other whale came flying out of the water, clearing the water completely, and made a huge splash. I can’t even tell you. I got a little choked up, I’m not gonna lie. To see a 40-50 foot whale, weighing upwards of 70,000 pounds, jump out of the water, doing what it just does naturally, it was amazing. Our biologist was about as shocked as we all were, telling us, “We can pretty much turn around and go home now; it’s not going to get any better than that.” I guess only about 1 in 10 trips get to see a breach. We ended up seeing several.


We stayed with the humpback whales for quite awhile, watching them surface and dive again and again. Then we heard a sighting of a pod of killer whales and headed off to find them. They had the same method as the humpbacks: surface for air for awhile, and then a big dive for food. Killer whales are much faster, so when they came up several minutes later, they could be quite a ways away and you had to speed up to them again. We stayed with them until we had to head back to land.

I was glad to get my feet back on land. And although I lost my sea legs quickly, I have a feeling those whales will hold a place in my memory as the most amazing site I’ve ever seen for much, much longer.