10-4-14 Twelve Thousand Pounds of Cuteness

Saturday, October 4th
...middle of the night calls over the Lime Kiln hydrophones...I heard a specific K pod call...so I figured it was probably the K Klik, J Pod and Onyx L-87...but one can never be sure...then, no whales seen until late morning, when all of a sudden there they showed up near Lime Kiln coming up island...
...Granny J-2 and her group were in the lead...by the time I got to the park I had missed them..but off in the distance little J-49 breached - pretty neat, eh?

...soon others approached...the J17s, the J16s, some of the Cookies...etc...and there were some Pacific white sided dolphins zooming around the whales! - that's now day 14 in a row for Lags to be here!

...off to the boat...arriving at Snug Harbor I see booms set out...uh, oh...but it was a practice drill...whew!

...out on Maya's Westside Charters to see whales...and they weren't very far...like right outside of the harbor...and the Lags were coming up too...they were zooming in and out around the whales and the boats...

...we got excited to see some Grebe's...a winter bird for around here...

...oops, almost didn't get out of Cookie J-38's way!

...in the middle of our travels Capt. Jim spotted something...upon closer look - lookie here...this might be the leftovers from the Transients' breakfast yesterday morning...not sure what animal it had been, but it sure looked pretty big...the whales don't eat the lungs or the ribs...

...we saw Tucker at work...

...the whales were moving slow but steadily up...Princess Angeline J-17 spyhopped at one point...

..whenever I see this boat I think of family I have who live in Homer...

...it poured rain for a short while...just long enough to get good and wet...and then the skies cleared...
...Cappuccino K-21 surfaced coming toward us...one of the passengers said he was 'cute'...I replied with "cute?...he's about 12,000lbs of cute...and about two minutes later he showed us how 'cute' he can be!...

...what? does he hear what we are saying??? !

...on the way back to the harbor...

...I know Jackson was amazed at the Pacific white sided dolphins as they swam along the front and sides of the boat...he then was wanting the killer whales to do that too...once explained the size of the whales in comparison to the size of the boat. I think he decided it was okay if they didn't!