What a great way to start the First of October! We had both baleen whale and toothed whales sighted! We set out on the Inspiration and while in the Mission bay channel, we sighted a couple of curious Inshore bottlenose dolphins! They beelined it to our bow for a surfing session! We ventured out to the west and started seeing birds sitting along the drop-off area. They must have just finished with a big feeding frenzy as there were so many scattered all around. We spotted a Minke whale pop up near by! It kept us on our toes, as it surfaced all around the boat and was mostly trending west. It gave us the slip, but not before we sighted a couple of large pods of dolphins on the horizon! We cruised out and noticed they were racing straight for us! They swarmed all around our boat and we were taken aback by so many Commons all around us! We estimated ~1500 Long-beaked Common dolphins were cruising in with the waves, which made it for a smooth ride in! We were even lucky to witness a stampede! A section of the pod all began to take off and zoom to the NE! The pod included a nursery pod because there were so many little flying footballs! The calves leaped out of the water porpoising beside us! We squealed with excitement! We spotted a huge Mola mola on the surface and a tiny flying fish on our way in! We also had an awesome encounter with about 10 to 15 Inshore bottlenose including a couple of calves!
Come out for a beautiful 3-hour tour soon! You will love it!
Naturalist,
Vanessa
