Grand Slam on the Atlantic Queen!

Double Lunge!
(Humpbacks Chromosome and Tripod)

Just returned from my trip on the Atlantic Queen. What a fantastic day! I haven't been on the boat in awhile so I was thrilled to get out and see what everyone else has been experiencing recently! I am even happier to report that we experienced what we call here a grand slam - 4 species in one trip!

Fin Whale

We started out with a trio of fin whales traveling together through calm, blue seas - a great way to start the trip! We then moved on to see Quote, a 26-year old female humpback whale.

Quote

Then we saw some splashing in the distance, and moved on to find some Atlantic white-sided dolphins - and 2 "logging" humpbacks! In my 15 years of whale watching, I've never seen this sight - 2 humpback whales resting while about 10 dolphins milled around, almost like they were waiting to see what the humpbacks were going to do next. With the help of our Research Coordinator, Dianna Schulte, we've identified these whales as two females - Valley, a humpback first seen in 1985 and Tornado, who was born in 1988 and just had a calf last year.

Resting Humpbacks
Valley (left) and Tornado (right)

Next we moved on to a pair of humpbacks who've been seen a lot lately, Chromosome and Tripod, who were pretty mellow but then a couple times blew a huge bubble cloud under water and then came up through it simultaneously, both with mouths wide open! All I remember is looking up and seeing row upon row of baleen right in front of us. Pretty cool. We also saw 2 minkes during the trip, and there were several blows in the distance we never got to - so plenty of whales around!

Tripod

Chromosome

Lots of birds around, too - Wilson's storm petrels, greater and sooty shearwaters, and a random gannet or two!