-9-Was That A Fluke?

We took our annual New Year's walk this year to Pigeon Point. It is a great place to walk and there is the added bonus of the possibility of spotting whales. Terry and I are sure that seeing whales in January is good luck, at least for us it is. We did not see any in 2008 and we all know how 2008 turned out. We had a great walk, but no whales were sighted. So we decided to pull out the stops and go to Point Lobos.

The great Gray whales make an annual migration south from Alaska to Baja California, give birth to their young and then return to Alaska. Talk about a tough commute! They pass by the California coast from late November until March going south, so January is prime whale watching season. They swim by the coast feeding as they go. Point Lobos is a westward jutting rocky finger that is just south of Monterey. Point Lobos south of Monterey and Point Reyes north of San Francisco are the best locations to see whales on the Northern California coast. If one wants to see whales during the migration season, neither location will disappoint.

Whale watching from the coast is a learned skill. First of all it is essentially free. Warm clothes and the time to watch are all that is required. Binoculars are not required, but are useful to track a whale once it has been spotted. The sight of a whale jumping out of the water ( called breaching) is not very common. The great Grays are 45 -50 feet long, about the size of a five story building if they stood on their tails. It is quite spectacular to see them breach, especially if they are close. The commercials for insurance companies with whales jumping out of the water and plunging back in on television are not very accurate for the California coast. We have seen them breach, but not very often.

What is very common is to see them spout. The key to spotting whales is to be able to successful detect the spouts. Spouts look like what they are: a white cloud poof of water vapor that hangs in the air for a few moments and then disperses. Whales will spout just as they reach the surface of the ocean after a dive. In fact they will spout 2-5 times before they take a new dive. The purpose of the spout is to clear out their breathing paths of water so they can draw a breath of fresh air. Whales are mammals with lungs, not fish with gills. They require oxygen in their lungs in order to breath. They dive down and hold their breath for 15 - 20 minutes (try that some time) before resurfacing.

The next most common sight in whale watching after spouts is to see the whale's tail called a fluke. The whales will arch their backs and flip their tails up out of the water just before they dive. If one is diligent about tracking the spouts, one can anticipate the dive and see the flukes rise above the water. You will spot whales if you understand the primitive dance developed over hundreds of thousands of years that the whale performs . Understand the moves and the motions and you will spot lots of whales.

Off to Point Lobos we went. We went early to be sure we were able to park close to the ocean. The day was clear and warm with very little breeze. Excellent whale spotting weather since there were no white caps on the surface of the ocean. We parked and walked about a mile or so out to the prime watching point. Please double click on the adjacent photo to get the effect of Point Lobos. There were lots of people along the way, couples, small groups and families. No one we talked to on our way out had seen any. Terry and I settled in on the rocks and before long we saw out first whale spout, then another and another...we stayed out there for about 4 hours. In that time period I would estimate we saw better than 50 whales. It is hard to be precise because the whales will spout multiple times, dive, reappear further south and repeat. They travel in groups called pods. When a pod goes by you see multiple whales spouting simultaneously so it can be difficult to determine just how many are in the pod.

People watching while whale watching is also fun. In this age of instant gratification, many pilgrims make the trip to the coast to see whales. They stop and look out to the ocean for 3-5 minutes, sigh and leave sad in the knowledge that they saw no whales. Many would stop and ask if we had seen any whales? Why yes we would say. The next question is where? One points to the ocean and says, why just out there. "Oh" they say, look out at the ocean for 2-5 minutes and then leave.

Kind of funny, kind of sad. We saw probably 10-12 whales per hour for 4 hours. In the same period of time, hundreds of people saw none. We did meet a young lady from New York who had recently taken a new job in Monterey. She was born in Morocco and knew nothing about whales, seals or otters. She stopped by and had the patience to watch for longer than a few minutes. Within 40 minutes she saw whales spouting, flukes, sea lions (their barking is the source of the name of Point Lobos), harbor seals and sea otters. She was thrilled by the whole scene and vowed to return with relatives who where on the way for a visit. We had another lady stop by just as a pod was spouting right in front of us. This person said she had been coming to Point Lobos for 26 years and had never seen a whale before (hard to believe but this is exactly what she said). Once she saw her whales, she left, her whale watching aspirations fulfilled.

Next time you are out walking, take a look around at all the wonders that are there, right before your eyes. Learn about the sky, the clouds, the nature, the the complex ecosystems that you are a part of. And take the time to look at the whole scene, you will not be disappointed.