After 96 hours of us acting incapacitated after 22 days travel, I coaxed Kelley out for a walk at Carmel Beach. The roads were less crowded than anticipated for a perfect 70 degrees Saturday just before noon time in Monterey. Fog looked to be moving in at the ridge on the northwest side of Monterey Peninsula at Pacific Grove as seen from our home. The skies over Carmel Hill ridge looked sky blue. Weather round here is like that in summer. For three days, after I returned home from Boston, the sun barely slipped out from behind the fog layer. Then Friday looked good and Saturday also dawned clear of fog.
Carmel Beach, July 25, 2015
Immediately upon sighting the ocean from above Carmel Beach we could tell there was major whale action within eyesight from the beach, in a strip of water beyond the kelp forest.
Humpback whale breaching off Carmel Beach.
Every time I put my camera away, we would glance over and see some spectacular splashes. Once several whales surfaced simultaneously. We thought there were five whales bubble netting for fish. Here is a link showing humpbacks bubble netting in clear video. The pod of whales we saw looked to be feeding together. The point of us being outside was to get a walk along Carmel Beach and I kept stopping to snap photos.
In my photos I only captured three spouts in a single photo, yet I saw two other areas of Carmel Bay with whale spouts. At least five whales in Carmel Bay. Primary viewing attention was happening for two humpback whales closest to shore for a solid hour by the beach.
Humpbacks weigh 30 to 50 tons (60,000 to 100,000 pounds). There is a big splash when they propel themselves out of the water.
Surfers on the beach think – “That was cool!”
And I think I had the best welcome home present I could ask for on my first day at the beach this July 2015, after 22 days in Europe and Boston and several days in hibernation this week in the summer fog days of Monterey.
A boater approached the whale feeding area and the smart creatures separated and started moving farther offshore. At just about the same time, fog started moving onshore. Our 30 hours of sunshine on parts of the Monterey Peninsula reverted back to fog day afternoons.
1 Comment
Comments are closed.