We weren’t to be disappointed on the return journey though, with a close well-performing Wilson’s Storm Petrel to keep me busy whilst Richard picked up on the first of a continuous stream of Fin Whale, with my subsequent dashes and screams drew his attention to a single Cuvier’s Beaked Whale and (dare I say) the same 5 or 6 Sperm Whale as the morning.

Many thanks go out to Britanny Ferries, the crew of the Cap Finistere, everyone at ORCA and of course on my part to Richard, for making the past 5 months as fun as they were.
I shall be back in due course to work with ORCA again (if they’ll have me!), and hope to see you all again soon – perhaps in more exotic climes!

Over, and out.

For what it’s worth, Rupert Grint supports ORCA, and joined me for a drink and a lengthy chat about conservation and cetaceans one evening.

Lisle Gwynn – ORCA Wildlife Officer

With the tail-end of the American Hurricane threatening to hail truly high seas, I placed bets against various members of the crew, predicting rough weather.  I could not have been more wrong, though I’ll gladly accept defeat if it means a calm crossing!  Starting well at 4p.m. in the mid English Channel, a large Minke Whale slinked east at a mid-distance affording views to the sunbathers present.  It was amazingly followed by another more distant Minke just inside the ever-present fog bank, meaning visibility was poor and only those with binoculars got a view.
An incredibly beautiful evening was crowned with a quite scarce ‘sun dog’, a limited-stretch of haze induced rainbow, followed by several Manx Shearwater, about 15 ‘British’ Storm-Petrel giving great views down the side of the ship and a hand-full of Harbour Porpoise moving serenely amongst the various fishing vessels in the western Channel.  It was obvious that food was plentiful in the area, and the remaining observers bid each other good night with high hopes for the morning as we entered the Bay.

As always, I was on deck in the darkness of morning, greeted by a flock of 8 Knot following the ship calling loudly for some time, with a Wood Warbler and Willow Warbler flitting around the deck, finally making it off-ship before the light broke.   As I’ve already said, my predictions were far from correct and we were met with absolutely mirror-calm seas as first light broke, perfect whale-watching conditions.  True to form, the first Cetaceans were within minutes with 15-20 Striped Dolphin moving low in the water, and with more present closer to the ship on the other side we joined those on the Port side.  As they slowly moved back and forth hunting in the water, I called out “more Dolphins up ahead!”.  It very quickly became very obvious that these “Dolphins” were not Dolphins, and were in fact Beaked Whales.  The size of them ruled out Cuvier’s immediately, and when the first was joined by another breaking sharply from the water with a crocodile-like beak I made the certain call of Sowerby’s Beaked Whale.  In an amazing 5 minutes these two individuals of an incredibly rarely sighted species rolled, surfaced and played alongside the ship at very close range giving incredible views to the lucky 6 of us who’d made it up early.  I’ll let the photographs do the talking right now, so please feel free to click the images to open them up larger for more detail.

This was an absolutely incredible start to the day with the sun not even having risen properly yet.  After a few ore Striped Dolphin I moved back to the slightly easier viewing conditions of the Atlantic-ward side of the ship, which was quickly rewarded with 20 or so Long-finned Pilot Whale seen only by those with binoculars, but thankfully a further c.20 joined the wake of the ship giving absolutely superb views, alongside 5 or 6 other unidentified cetaceans with very ‘sharp’ and large dorsal fins, resembling Risso’s/White-beaked type Dolphins.

We didn’t have to wait long for the next area of excitement, and after about 30 minutes at around 8a.m. we came across a vast area of activity which included an Ocean Sunfish and 2 Portuguese Man of War Jellyfish floating alongside the ship, whilst about 200 yards out 5 tiny patches of surface disturbance gave rise to a huge Leatherback Turtle being followed by a flotilla of around 4 Wilson’s Storm Petrels and 2 ‘British’ Storm Petrel along with a couple of Cory’s Shearwater at a mid-distance.  Whilst enjoying these less-than-abundant ocean wanderers 4 heads and backs broke the surface at around a mile distance.  With everyone ‘on to’ them and seeing the slick dark backs and big-foreheads breaking the still incredibly calm surface I made the confident call of Northern Bottlenose Whale.  A total of 4 or 5, they were on show for almost 10 minutes whilst we slowly passed, though almost immediately after I had identified these and looked forth ahead of the ship a brute of a male Cuvier’s Beaked Whale rolled in a south-westerly direction 5 or 6 times, seen by all, before it dived deep in search of squid.

As we approached the coast of Spain, a huge front swept toward us almost immediately culling cetacean sightings and increasing the wind to a good force 5, though the ocean remained eerily calm.  Despite a lack of cetaceans, a large number of birds were caught up in the front, including c.10 Willow-Chiff type warblers, a Wheatear, a couple of distant finches, 2 Arctic Skua (1 light phase, 1 dark), 5 Sabine’s Gulls, 4 or 5 Cory’s Shearwater, 1 Balearic Shearwater, and 1 Sooty Shearwater.  One bird that may be of particular interest to keen European birders, was a small spotty-chested Thrush seeming quite distressed uttering an unfamiliar but constant call and sadly never landing on the ship, nor being quite close enough for a definite identification.

Having grabbed a couple of hours kip and a good steak & chips for lunch I was more than ready for the ocean to surprise me once more for the return afternoon.  Not expecting a lot, given the more-than-generous dealings of the morning, I was pleasantly surprised.  Almost immediately at 3:30p.m. we were given very close views of about 50 Common Dolphin, 2 Portuguese Man of War, a Flying Fish and around 200 huge Tuna.  Now, things happen in a very short space of time here at sea, and this day was no different.  In the space of 3 hours, the Bay had come alive with huge schools of enormous Tuna and Common Dolphin.  In total, between 3:30 and 4:45 I estimate around 200 Common Dolphin and an incredible 500 Atlantic Blue-fin Tuna along with several Cory’s Shearwater, 2 Balearic Shearwater and 2 Sooty Shearwater.

After an incredibly tough talk, featuring 20 Striped and Common Dolphin and c.15 more Tuna from the back window, I emerged up on-deck at 6p.m. to descriptions of what were most probably 3 Cuvier’s Beaked Whale gently rolling down the side of the boat just 5 minutes previously, complete with descriptions of a “brown body, with a white head”.  Gripping.  Alas, knowing Mother Nature wouldn’t let us down I set to scanning the ocean for dark bodies, and amongst a further 100 or so Tuna came 2 huge rolling bodies a long way ahead of the ship.  Holding fire with my suspected ID but alerting the hordes of people present to be vigilant we were in shock and awe as an absolutely HUGE Whale erupted from the mirror-calm sea just 150 yards from the boat, giving perfect views of the creature, even close enough to allow me to run up and down the deck making sure everyone took note of the visible blow-holes, rostrum & splash-guard and long but blunt dorsal fin that made this, and the further 5 Whales that had now joined it, Fin Whales.  Giving incredible views of them surfacing, blowing, feeding and rolling onto their sides with pectoral fins in the air within 500 metres of the boat, they were soon joined by two very close Cuvier’s Beaked Whale that took almost no notice whatsoever of us or the larger rorquals and just moved on by quickly but close to the boat.

With the emotion and adrenaline running out, after half an hour or so most had been fulfilled and left with handshakes, thanks and huge smiles, whilst I of course kept a steady vigil with another observer.  Soon rewarded with a small blow (though the classic Father Ted “small or far away” system may have to be employed here…) I picked up on several Tuna leaping, leading me to doubt my previous assertion.  Just a second later a long log-like body pointed to the original culprit, a small Sperm Whale.  On view for mere seconds, it was lost amongst the small swell and not seen to blow again.  This proved to be the last large cetacean of the trip, though as the sun set the returning 20 or so die-hards were treated to something new for the season… ‘baby’ Common Dolphins.  These absolutely tiny creatures can’t have been more than a couple of days old and stayed close to their mothers as they leapt and shot under the boat to join a few more on the other side.

A quiet jaunt through the English Channel closed this absolutely remarkable trip, leaving me to wonder:  What will next trip hold?  High seas, or mirror-calm?  Crawling with life, or vacant?  We will soon see…

Lisle Gwynn  -  ORCA Wildlife Officer

Throughout many years of searching high and low, all across the shores of the UK and abroad, Orca (a.k.a. Killer Whales) has always eluded me.  Despite many possible and probables over the years, I’ve never had a 100% confirmed definite Orca, despite being very close on many occasions, and various sightings of definite large dorsal fins at sea, which have quickly disappeared and not been seen again.
At around 8:30a.m. on the 7^th July we approached the beginning of the canyons that run out from just offshore of N. Spain, home to some of our most fascinating species.  After instructing the 15 or so strong assembled crowd not to neglect waters close to the boat, as Cuvier’s Beaked Whale has a habit of surfacing very close, I commenced one of my regular binocular scans of the mid-distance.  Soon into the scan I picked up on an enormous black dorsal fin sailing through the swell and uttered a loud “OH!” which was met by inquisitive “What?” “what is it?” “What’ve you got?”’s, not wanting to commit and disappoint I waited a few seconds to see if my suspicions were correct.  Before I could reply, an enormous head rose from the swell revealing a big white “eye” patch, enormous dorsal fin and grey saddle… “KILLER WHALE!!!” the time had come for my nemesis and I to finally meet.  Now if only my brain would catch up with my heart, and start believing my eyes…

In true Orca fashion, this was no half-effort sighting.  Complete with two youngsters in tow, a large female and huge male Killer Whale powered through the waves for mere seconds before disappearing below the surface, leaving a disappointed but adrenaline-fuelled crowd.  I was the only one who’d seen enough to confirm they were Orca… After 30 seconds of worrying that they wouldn’t reappear, a cry went up from a member of the crowd: “DOLPHINS” – at least they’ll see something I thought to myself, hoping there wouldn’t be too much disappointment…

Well, I guess they were half right, it was a dolphin… Fact of the matter is it was a 10 metre black and white Dolphin with a 6 foot dorsal fin, powering towards us at only 100 metres distance… For probably only 2 minutes we enjoyed prolonged views of these huge and incredible animals as they came into the side, and under the boat, one by one.  Through the excitement, shaking hands and trying to make sure everyone saw them, the following is the only photo I managed… It’s enough to show this is a true tale, but not enough to quench my thirst for the Orca… We will meet again, friend.

Lisle Gwynn – ORCA Wildlife Officer

This enthusiasm was well rewarded on the first leg of the outward journey, as a few people joined me on deck to see a good sample of our more coastal species.  At around 4p.m. we encountered a pod of 3 or 4 probable Risso’s Dolphins off the coast of Devon, rolling through the waves amongst an area of diving Gannets, their enormous dorsal fins clearly visible at some distance.  Just moments after this event we were alerted to some small brown shapes in the water, which duly turned out to be a pod of 7 Harbour Porpoise rolling, puffing and panting along the side of the ship only around 30 metres away.  Such close views are rare from a ship of this size as they are usually very shy animals.  Given the already fantastic sightings, people were forgiven for ducking below deck for some rest at 4:30, though it was soon clear this was to be a mistake…   At around 4:40p.m. and at only 4 or 500 metres range, prolonged and repeated views of a Minke Whale surfacing, blowing and continuing on its way were enjoyed by just myself.  This served as an ample reminder that the waters around our coast are certainly very important for marine life.

Rising bright and early, the 7^th July is set to go down in history as one of the best mornings of my life.  At 8:30a.m. we had an incredible sighting of a pod of 4 Killer Whales (Orca).  To avoid an epically long post, please see the above account of this incredible experience…

Not too long after the Killer Whale event, a passenger put up a holler of “What’s THAT?!”, stepping forth into the wind and cold I was able to ensure the assembled crowd all got prolonged views of one of the Bay’s most special creatures… the Cuvier’s Beaked Whale.  A successful morning!

The return journey unfortunately was not quite as exciting, though surely not a lot could compare to that morning.  However, adrenaline was pumping and voices were raised to make sure everybody got a look at the big female Cuvier’s Beaked Whale found by a very young gent and his dad, who quickly became mariner stalwarts, joining me on deck at any opportunity, and picking up on the hundreds of Common Dolphins almost always before me.  Absolutely amazing spotting skills those guys.

We’re deep in the English Channel as I write this, with visibility down to 20 metres or less due to thick fog, so I’m left to contemplate:  What will the next crossing bring?  Will we encounter the Orcas again?  Check back on Sunday to find out…

Lisle Gwynn – ORCA Wildlife Officer