The best whale watching in Western Australia was demonstrated in a perfect example today in magnificent Flinders Bay, Augusta. Our first meeting began with two enormous male Humpbacks travelling in a bachelor pod. Full of beans and on the lookout for a female they spied us from a few hundred meters away and started to power towards our bow. Surfacing and circling us only a few meters away we were surrounded by two big boys who were releasing some of their pent up energy by interacting with us. A little while later they continued the search as they quickly began to cover some ground and four tall blows caught our attention. Enormous tail lobs launched skyward as the primary escort male dominantly tried to deter new challengers. The competition pod unfolded under our feet as the five males chased after the female as tail lobbing and tail slapping continued, eventually only one male remained and happily swam away with his girl. Augusta provides the best whale watching while onboard with our pod and the afternoon was to step up to the next level again as we revelled in the energy of the whales surrounding us.
The action certainly wasn’t over yet and a beautiful young female Humpback began to flirt as she breached high into the sky. We journeyed towards her and she continued her breaching over and over again, repeating this incredibly spectacular behaviour. Her travelling companion was a young male who seemed to be trying to keep up with this young female who was covering a large amount of ground after every breach. Suddenly, the local Bottlenose Dolphins surged passed the female and raced straight towards our bow to say good afternoon. They then joined with the young male who was following and began to play while the female continued her breaching spectacle… where to look! After half an hour of continuous breaching she finally captured the attention of the males, one who was particularly enormous. Slightly nervous all of a sudden she raced towards us to search for a quick sound footprint to hide in. It worked and the male settled, enabling her to continue a few more breaches to let him know she was still interested.
