Whales

One of the interesting things we are discovering is that our home province has a lot to offer in the way of interesting activities. You tend to take the things close at hand for granted instead of looking at them from the perspective of an "out of towner."
We decided to drive to Briar Island and go whale watching. Now we know this has been a great area for whale watching, read about it and heard lots about it BUT we have never driven to the end of Digby Neck to Briar Island to do it.
We started out on a beautiful, warm Monday morning. The weather forecast was good, sunny, warm and light winds and the marine forecast indicated that it would be a fog free day, which is something rare for the Fundy Shore! The drive to Briar Island was great. Nice scenery, and our timing was perfect as we were the last vehicle on the 1st ferry to Long Island and drove right on to the second ferry to Briar Island.
Westport is a beautiful little village that was originally settled in 1769 as a fishing station. Some of today's family names originate from the eleven Loyalist families that arrived in 1783. Perhaps Westport's most famous person was Captain Joshua Slocum, the first person to sail around the world solo in his sloop "Spray." Slocum"s mother was born on Briar Island and he made Westport his first port of call after leaving Boston for his famed voyage. He visited the area many times and there is a monument erected on the southern end of the island in his honour.

We has a couple of hours to spare before our whale watching trip so we walked around the village sightseeing. The tour company we had our reservation with was Briar Island Whale and Seabird Cruises Ltd. They are also heavily involved in Whale research and studies so the knowledge of their staff is excellent.

Our boat left at 5:30 in the evening and it looked like a full load of whale watchers of all ages. The water was extremely calm, winds were almost non-existent and it was quite warm, although later in the evening everyone would be adding the sweaters and jackets they were advised to bring. On our way out we passed harbour seals and began to see various seabirds such as murres, puffins  and shearwaters. There were others, but our limited knowledge of seabirds did not let us identify them. After about  an hour out we saw our first whales. They were humpbacks, but a fair distance from the boat. However about 20 minutes later we slowed down and came to a stop, with four humpbacks surfacing, diving and feeding right next to us. What a fantastic sight! They were three adults and a calf. The calf was not named but our crew recognized the three adults as Luna, Little Spot and 0034. Humpback whales have distinctive markings on their tails (flukes) that are like a fingerprint. Apparently no two are the same. This is how the researchers identify each whale and are able to keep track of its location and frequency of sighting.
The whales seemed to have no level of discomfort with the boat so close (the engines were shut off) and actually seemed to be performing for us. These are large animals. They can reach 50 feet in length (ours were around 40 feet long) and weigh many tons. They are so streamlined that they barely disturb the water as they move through it. They would surface, spout and then dive again and barely leave a ripple on the water.
Time was starting to run out and we had to head for home port as it was getting late. As we were approaching land, the boat changed course and stopped. We were all looking around as the Captain had obviously seen something we had not. I looked over the side of the boat and thought I could see white sand bottom, but it was moving. A humpback just passed under us and surfaced within 10 feet of the boat. There were two of them and they put on a spectacular performance for us by waving flippers and tails at us for about 10 minutes. What a way to wind up the evening!! 20 minutes later we were back in our truck and heading away from Briar Island, tired but extremely happy with the fantastic day we had and magnificent creatures we were privileged to spend some time with. If you ever have the chance, go watch the whales! Watch for a whale photo library to be posted soon with some of the 200 pictures we took.
P & N


Procrastination is the art of keeping up with yesterday.
  - Don Marquis