Whale of a Day

There have been many highlights in the last six weeks for me, and the whale watching trip this morning was another. We set out in the rain which continued for the whole trip, but it was well worth getting soaked. We were told that most trips see one or two whales, and anything more than that is a bonus. We saw nine or ten sperm whales, six of them at close quarters. This constitutes a “pod” of whales, in this case adolescent males, the females being located in tropical waters.

Sperm whales are the largest of the toothed whales and they spend six or seven minutes on the surface resting and spouting water from their blowholes, which are towards the front of the head and on the left side. They then take a huge breath, with enough oxygen to last them for the forty-five minutes they spend diving for food, usually to a depth of about one thousand metres.

Jean

Dusky Dolphins

As if this wasn’t enough, we had the luck to see a pod of dusky dolphins, arcing in and out of the water. The numbers were incredible, up to about three hundred and, although my photos don’t do this part of the trip justice, I have the images in my memory. Some of them even decided to leap right out of the water and splash back in.

Jean

Seabirds

Whilst out on the boat wandering albatrosses and Huttons shearwaters also put in appearances, along with many others.

Back onshore this afternoon and evening, we were delighted to see some shags drying off their wings on some rather interesting rock formations, oystercatchers amongst the rocks and some herons picking up their supper from the pools.

Jean

Seals

There are quite a few seal colonies around this part of the coast and we spotted four seals together on rocks just outside Kaikoura town centre. This guy was the biggest. They seem oblivious to tourists but can attack if roused and 10 or 20 metres is near enough. Dave

P.S. For those still reading, this is our 200th blog since we set out on October 15 !

Fyffe House

Robert Fyffe came from Scotland to Kaikoura in the early 1840s and set up a whaling station. He and then his cousin lived in this house (left), followed by two other families who were involved with the local wharf and fishing. When the last of them died off in 1980 he handed it over in his will to the Conservation Trust and it’s now open to the public. An unbroken link to the whaling days. Dave