Have you ever seen a double breach? Lucky guests aboard Tuesday’s Wake Up With the Whales Cruise on Seasmoke got to see this very exciting surface activity about midway through our cruise. We were watching Mom and her baby being chased by two male Humpbacks when all of a sudden Mom and one of the escorts breached simultaneously right next to some kayakers. The splash they created actually hid the kayakers from our view — we could only imagine what they must have been thinking when these big whales erupted out of the water together.After that, baby breached about 4 times, and head lunged a few more times. We also got a couple of very close encounters when Humpbacks decided to surface off our port stern. Our 10:00 Whale Watch on Alala started with a huge breach just after we had left the harbor. When a cruise starts that good, everything else we see just adds to the excitement. We found a very small calf on this cruise, swimming and diving down to Mom…and we also saw some tail lobbing from another adult Humpback. On our Whales and Cocktails Cruise out of Kawaihae, we got to see a Cow/Calf/Escort close to the boat, but the grand finale was watching a big adult Humpback breach 8 times!

Mahalo,

Claire

Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Researchers off the coast of Brazil have discovered that some marine mammals including Humpbacks may have up to 14 spleens. Among other functions, the spleen stores red blood cells (which store oxygen)…so an extra spleen may help a deep diving animal stay underwater longer. These spleens can contract during a dive, releasing fresh blood with oxygenated red blood cells to keep the whale’s important organs alive and functioning. 14 spleens?! Amazing.