Image: A smiley-faced humpback whale mugged us so close you could see the hairs growing out of its rostrum and chin.
2024 09–20 SB Channel
It was a windy, sloppy, bumpy day in The Channel. Captain Dave and the crew worked the northern side. We slowly angled up the coast to the southwest and ended up about 8 miles off of UCSB, a little more than halfway to The Lanes. From there we hooked around to the east and finally angled back home to the northwest. There was abundant marine life everywhere we went. Sightings were phenomenal: 2500 dolphins and 11 humpback whales.
Dolphins were actively surfing the wind chop and swells. As they located the Condor Express they added our side, stern and bow waves to their venue. We watched a couple of hundred dolphins just 4 miles out from The Harbor. Moving west, off Goleta, the herds got larger. During our sessions with the humpback whales, there were many more dolphins along with them. Lots of bait was in the water, and despite the choppy surface, we could see the fish looking down from the boat.
When we were at our farthest point, 8 miles off of The Campus, we came upon 4 adult whales. All of them were very large animals. They immediately became friendly with the boat, and we had our first major mugging session of the trip. In addition to mugging, the whales were very vocal and issued lots of trumpet blows. Before long an additional pair of whales joined the fun. They immediately swam up and down both sides of the boat, and one of them performed a headstand, waving its tail in the air.
As the wind was picking up, and the seas were increasing, we moved east (and then north) to put it all astern. Before long, we found an additional pair of whales that were feeding on the abundant bait balls. We saw several surface lunge feeding episodes. Closer to shore, and near the kelp farm, we rounded out our sightings with four more friendly whales. Again, we found ourselves involved in another mugging session. What a day!
You never know what Mother Nature has in store.
Bob Perry
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