Out of the jetties to the glassy Pacific we headed, starting out unusually calm And quiet with barely a ripple beyond the slow rolling long period swell.
It was so calm we saw the grey shadowy bodies of the dolphins before the splashes.
Initially we had a pod of ~50 long-beaked common dolphins who were having a lazy Sunday, keeping a slow pace bow-riding along with the Privateer.
Changing direction after leaving the first pod we stumbled upon a much larger and more spread out pod of ~250 long-beaked commons showing us travel mode behaviour.
Something spooked them and they scattered, splitting the pod in 3 sub-sects and we watched them continue in 3 different directions.
The smaller pod we kept up with porpoised along in a dense formation.
Not everyday do we actively see how dynamic dolphin pods are,and watch them divide.
We ended the sunset trip with an eerie red sliver of sun in the dense cloud bank before heading home to Mission Bay.
-Naturalist Ruth
