Mr Liable, sei whales and dolphins

In the morning our two zodiacs started the trip with a wonderful show right outside Ponta Delgada: a huge group of common dolphins feeding on mackerel together with lots of Cory's shearwaters, common terns and yellow-legged gulls. Afterwards we decided to leave the show because we had something bigger waiting for us. On the way to the big animals we found a small group of playful bottlenose dolphins and then we went straight to observe a sei whale which was swimming quite fast, probably following the migration route. Shortly after we decided to leave the whale because we had a male sperm whale waiting for us at the surface. After a while, the animal dove to the depths, showing the tail and allowing us to identify it us a well known sperm whale: Mr Liable. On our way back to Ponta Delgada we went to see again the baleen whales, but this time we found 4 sei whales, also continuing on their migration towards the west of the island. It has been a morning full of animals!

In the afternoon we resighted the sei whales, which may have been be the same individuals as in the morning. We got some nice surprises with the sei whales turning curious and they came close to our catamaran, on both our sides, making us feel surrounded by whales for a moment. We also resighted Mr Liable, the large sperm whale male, and once again he gave us that marvelous fluke which we can recognise him from. Closer to shore we encountered a large group of common dolphins that were very playfully jumping around us. Once again in the afternoon we were surrounded by cetacean species. They had plenty of babies, and some of them were jumping high our of the air (see photos below). During the afternoon we also came across a very small loggerhead turtle.

We hope that all our clients have a great stay in São Miguel, and wish everybody a happy World Oceans Day!

Video of the common dolphins from the afternoon

Photos from the morning:

Sei whale outside Ponta Delgada

Sei whale surfacing and blowing

 Sei whale showing its fluke

 Detail of the blowholes of the sei whale

Mr Liable diving

One of our zodiacs

Common dolphins feeding together with yellow-legged gulls, Cory's shearwaters and common terns

Common dolphin juvenile surfacing next to its mother

"Dark" common dolphins

Yellow-legged gull capturing a mackerel

Yellow-legged gull hovering over a school of mackerel jumping at the surface

Photos from the afternoon:

The rainbow (it was a dubble) in the start of our afternoon tour

Two out of three sei whales

Mr. Liable (sperm whale)

Aboard our catamaran Cetus

Common dolphin

Two adult and a baby

Close up of the baby jumping high

Aboard our catamaran "Cetus"

Whales and dolphins in the big blue

Today we encountered three species: sperm whales, a fin whale and common dolphins. In the morning we started with our first sperm whales for the day. We had to wait a while for them to surface, but in the end we had a nice encounter with 3 adult sperm whales on the surface together. Closer to shore we found a group of common dolphins towards the end of the morning. In afternoon we returned to sea with our catamaran only. This time it was not our onshore lookouts that spotted the whales, rather it was our captain who spotted the first whale activity for the tour. While searching offshore he saw a whale breach (jump clear out of the water). When we arrived to the area we had to wait a while again, but again it was worth it. This time we encountered a single sperm whale that looked like a young male from the very large head it had. After our sperm whale encounter we went inshore to try to find some dolphins, but instead we came across a fin whale. It's nice to still have a migratory whale species here at this time of the year. All of our encounters today were in a choppy ocean with a bit of wind, but this made our it all the more exciting and made the ocean a beautiful brilliant blue colour. The waves were also great for sometimes seeing more of the animal through the water, especially the surfing dolphins in the morning and the tail of the whales as they were swimming through the waves.

Photos from the morning:

One of the three sperm whales of the morning tour

Three sperm whales at the surface together

Sperm whale fluke

Common dolphins surfing a wave

Our zodiac boat with common the common dolphins

Our two zodiacs

Photos from the afternoon:

Boarding our catamaran "Cetus"

Leaving Ponta Delgada

Sperm whale

Sperm whale stretching

Fin whale

The time of the sperm whales and sei whales

Today, our morning trip started with an encounter of a large group of bottlenose dolphins not far away from Ponta Delgada, they were delighting us with their jumps and bowriding in front of our whale watching boat. A few minutes later our swimming with dolphins boat joined us and we both could enjoy the dolphins together. After a while we decided to leave the swimmers alone and continue our trip trying to find more species of cetaceans. After the dolphin encounter, our lookout guided us to the area of a sperm whale, when we arrived we were waiting a few minutes when suddenly we saw a misty blow far away from us. The blow from the sperm whale is lower than the blow from the baleen whales that we have seen in the past months, and during a windy trip as today it is more difficult to see. Still, we managed to arrive to its area just before it dove. After this brief meeting we had the announcement from the lookout that another sperm whale was close to us, again we saw the fluke... but we wanted to see more! Luckily the most beautiful present was waiting for us... we found a mother with a calf blowing in the surface, they were very calm and we could finally enjoy them for a while before they dove showing their flukes almost at the same time, giving us the perfect picture for our excited clients. At the end of the trip we found a group of hundreds of common dolphins, looks like summer time it is just around the corner when we see this large groups! Once again they were very friendly and playful, perfect to finish the trip.

In the afternoon we had two boats out on the ocean and also two sei whales. The sei whales were almost bowriding our catamaran like giant dolphins, but we did have a few common dolphins bowriding while we were watching the whales. We could see the two blowholes of the baleen whales very well today. After the whales we headed to an area of more common dolphins. They were very playful in the waves we had, leaping high out of the water and surfing the waves.  

Photos from the morning:

Sperm whale with a calf

Two common dolphins surfacing

 Our whale watching boat behind bottlenose dolphins

 Swimmer next to the bottlenose dolphins

 Swimmers waiting for go to sea 

 Bottlenose dolphin

Photos from the afternoon:

Sei whale blow

Sei whale