Upon arrival in Monterey, we booked a whale watch for Saturday morning. It was pretty breezy that morning, and I was just freezing (and have been every day since we got here!). While waiting to get on the boat, Greg and I took some time to observe the California sea lions all over the docks. Those sea lions were loud and so funny. We watched as they fought with each other and jockeyed for position on the docks and buoys. Super cute.

The boat was pretty full of passengers, and the water was very choppy. We found several humpbacks along the way, but they weren’t very active. These whales have migrated north from Mexico and are looking for food in the form of sardines. We didn’t see any mother-calf pairs because they haven’t arrived yet. Most groups were comprised of 2 - 4 whales which seemed to be feeding together. I was a little bummed because the activity was pretty minimal, but on our way back into harbor, we spotted a breacher in the distance. As we came upon this lone whale, he continued to breach - about 30 times. Woo hoo! So our whale watch turned out pretty damn good after all.

Afterwards, we went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, which I really enjoyed. It’s so much better than the Georgia Aquarium because they make a big effort to educate patrons about the environment and how to be better stewards of the Earth. The Monterey exhibits were very beautiful. They are housing an amazing jellyfish exhibit that features the animals accompanied by complementary art. There is also an entire kids section devoted to marine mammals. There are hands-on demonstrations that show kids the difference between baleen and toothed whales’ feeding methods. There are also life-sized models of gray and orca whales in the aquarium.

When the aquarium closed, we spent a bit of time wandering around Cannery Row and tried to catch an IMAX film of prehistoric ocean animals, but the projector was broken, so we walked back to the hotel. All in all, it was a very busy day with lots of excitement.

We enjoyed the whale watch so much that we decided to book another one on Sunday morning at 7:00. Sunday’s trip wasn’t as fun as the first one, but we did catch a breach and some other interesting things. We saw a couple of sea otters - one with a baby - floating along in the water. We saw plenty of sea lions pretty far out, as well as some moon jellies - hundreds of them!

One of the coolest sights was when the sea lions merged with a couple of whales to engage in a massive feeding episode. One of the whales was really pissed about something and kept trumpet blowing. He did it near our boat twice and then two more times while feeding near the sea lions. It was quite a sight to see those massive forms mingling with much smaller ones in an ancient dance for survival. Breathtaking.

I was kind of bummed that we didn’t get to see any gray whales on either whale watch, but I still saw new things, and that was exciting. That’s the thing about going on a boat - you never know what you’ll encouner, but it’s different every time.

We headed back toward San Francisco after the whale watch, but we stopped on the way at the Mystery Spot in Santa Cruz. This was a truly bizarre experience that I am still trying to figure out. I have resigned myself to the fact that it was all optical illusions, but some of it still puzzles me. I can’t stop trying to figure it out!

The story goes that in the early 1900s a man bought this strange piece of land that had weird properties. There was a 150 foot diameter space in which compasses didn’t work properly and which caused people to become dizzy when they entered it. Now there is a small building which rests on the spot. It supposedly slid partially down the hill, so it is at an odd angle. As soon as I walked inside, I became immediately dizzy. I felt like I was going to fall over. When standing in this place, everyone is at a 17 degree angle. There is a pendulum inside that hangs like a pendulum should, but when you push it one way, it feels much heavier than when you push it the opposite way. The guide used levels to show that places along the floor and beams were truly level with gravity, and yet when he put a ball on them, they would appear to roll uphill. When clearly tall people were put next to short people and then switched places, the short person became taller than the tall person. It was just too weird! I know there is an explanation for it - namely forced perspective of observers - but some of it I can’t fathom. I want to go back with my own pendulum, lever, and a blindfold to see how it affects a person who can’t see. The dizziness was really weird because as soon as I left the building, I was fine. The guide said that sometimes people pass out in there. Freaky!

Greg and I left the Mystery Spot and continued back up to San Francisco where we met my Aunt Chris and Uncle Steve for early dinner. We walked all around San Francisco and ended up eating at The Stinking Rose - an all garlic restaurant. It was actually very good food. I enjoyed catching up with Chris and Steve. They moved out here several months ago, so I haven’t seen them in quite a while. It was nice to see familiar faces!

Today Greg and I basically walked all over SF again. We took the cable car to Fisherman’s Wharf and stayed there most of the day shopping and watching people. Pier 39 was interesting. We found the Marine Mammal Center store and bought tons of stuff there to support their conservation efforts with sea lions and other mammals. Greg was so sweet - he bought me the Encyclopedia of Marine Mammals, a book I have wanted for a long time but put off buying because it is very expensive. I’m such a dork - I can’t wait to get it home and start reading through its 1,000+ pages.

We found a bunch of other items such as books and knick knacks for the kids. We took the cable car back to our hotel and noticed a Lush store just down the street. Of course, I went in a bought a few things. :-)

After a martini in the hotel bar, Greg and I grabbed a taxi to an Indian restaurant, Roti, where we had a nice meal and good conversation. Greg’s out now wandering the streets of SF as I type and look at my pictures from the last couple of days. Tomorrow, he has to go to his conference, and I’ll probably catch up on some whale work.

What led me to find out about biomimetics was a podcast I downloaded (all hail the podcast! Oi, oi, oi!) from NPR about how scientists have employed “fin designs” based on the humpback whale’s pectoral fin. They used the fin design to create windmills with greater lift. If the windmills have greater lift, they can work better in areas with low wind to create renewable energy. Pretty cool, eh?

Anyway, I’m going to read more on this topic and see what else I can learn. I’d like to employ some biomimetics in the curriculum I’m helping to write for the Whale Class in 2008.

Now I’m sitting at the Hervey Bay airport, waiting for 6:00 to arrive so I can get to Brisbane. I hate the airport. I’m stressed because I had a hard time getting in touch with Greg. I’m exhausted. I just want to be home now, and I won’t be there for another two days. As wonderful as my time here was, I’m just physically and emotionally ready for it to be over. Very intense and draining.

In the meantime, here are 10 things I learned from my research internship:

1. 1. Field research is tough work. People think, “Wow, you’re going to Australia to watch whales for two weeks. How awful for you.” You have no idea what your body goes through as you’re being tossed around a boat with the sun, wind, and waves brutally beating you. You spend the majority of time waiting for something to happen. Some days, things happen frequently and quickly, but a lot of times, you just sit watching and nothing goes down. Your eyes start playing tricks on you. Also, having to wear a motion sickness patch depresses your body’s systems, so it’s hard to stay awake sometimes. The ocean has her own agenda and bows to no one. Therefore, as a researcher, you are at her mercy as well as that of the whales. We spent two hours with a mom and calf just waiting for mom to fluke. She didn’t feel much like cooperating that day. Times like that can be pretty frustrating. Every night when we got home, we ate dinner and pretty much crashed. I got up at 5:30 or earlier every morning, and we stayed on the water until at least 4:00 before the 2 hour boat trip back to the harbor. So, basically, it was 12 hours a day with one pee break off the back of the boat. I don’t know how I did it.
2. 2. You can never apply too much sunscreen. Queensland is the skin cancer capital of the world. Yep, it’s true. More skin cancer here than anywhere else in the world. Even when it’s not sunny, you get burned. My hands were burned bright red the second day out because I forgot to put sunscreen on them. Heidi got a horrible heat rash. It may have even been sun poisoning. I applied sunscreen four times on my last day out, and I still got burned on my face. My hands are also peeling on the palms, which didn’t really even see sun.
3. 3. Whales, like people, have distinctive personalities. Just as we have our grumpy moods and bad days, the whales seem to have similar experiences. We encountered some moms who seemed very protective of their calves, carefully positioning themselves between the calf and the boat and guiding the baby away from us when it got too close. On the other hand, there was the mom who seemed fine with the calf coming right up to us. She kept an eye on the baby, but let him explore. We also had the three muggers who were interested in the boat but then turned aggressive toward us. Then there were the two muggers a few days later who just hung out with us and sang. Those two were my favorites! Some whales show no interest in the boat at all, and some can’t get enough. Some would go back and forth between us and bigger whale watch boats. Even the calves had personalities. On our last day, we had the mom and calf sleeping throughout our lunch. Then the calf seemed to wake up and got frisky immediately. He started breaching like he was just so full of energy and had to get it out. A lot like a little kid!
4. 4. Most Australian boat captains are fun (except for stinky fish boat man). Listening to the whale watch captains on the radio was very entertaining at times. It was interesting to see how they treated Quincy. She was the only female captain, so in some ways she had to prove herself worthy of them. For the record, I think she did this. The captains started talking to her a lot and teasing with her. They also recognized that she was good at finding whales and often asked in their boats could join us. The one exception to the fun captains was a guy who pulled up a couple of times when we were refueling in the morning. He had the stinkiest boat, so we dreaded it when we saw him coming. He always seemed to be in a foul mood. Probably because he had to smell stinky clams all day.
5. 5. There is no such thing as waterproof. No matter how much layering I did, I always got wet. My foul weather jacket and pants were a must, but I still always managed to get wet on the boat. Some days were much worse than others. Usually it was repeated splashes in the face by rogue waves. Heidi and I usually sat on the bow, so we were subjected to a lot of salt water in the face. Sunglasses helped, but I always had salt on my lips at the end of the day. Also, my gear was covered in salt every night. Nasty. One day, our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches actually had salt water on them. How the water got through a sealed Tupperware, I’ll never know.
6. 6. “Just don’t think about it.” My first day on the boat (and many days after that) it struck me that I was in the middle of the ocean and I could drown. When a huge wave comes over the side of the boat at you, you see your life flashing before your eyes. When you crawl from the front to the back using nothing but small hand-holds as the boat races through the water, the thought of falling in is foremost in your mind. When the boat crashes down hard enough that you think you just lost 2 inches in height and you almost fly over the side, you think you might not make it back home. When you feel like you are riding a roller coaster from hell for 90% of the trip, you wonder if you’ll be able to keep breakfast down. When a 50 ton whale starts lobtailing 20 feet off your port side and then breaching directly in front of you, you wonder if you’ll ever see your family again. I quickly figured out the first day that the best way to deal with this stuff is just not to think about it. I told myself pretty much every day when I was presented with a scary situation, “Just don’t think about it.”
7. 7. Mother Nature will never do the expected. I swear, no matter what we thought the weather or sea would be like on our way out each day, Mother Nature served us up the exact opposite. On days when we thought it wouldn’t be that bad, it was 10 times worse than I expected. On days when I was scared that it would be terrible, it was calm and sunny. Mother Nature loves to play games with our heads. It’s best not to have any expectations and just take what she gives.
8. 8. The whales will teach you something new every day. When you’re on a tiny boat like the Naiad, you get the treat of seeing everything way closer than you would on a whale watch. I noticed little things like the inhalation after the blow that I never heard before. The grunt that some whales make at the end of a breath, the way the blow holes squeeze shut, how the barnacles actually hang like jewelry and swing with the motion of the whale, the hairs on the whale’s chin. These are just a few of the nuances you cannot get when on a bigger boat. Also, the dynamics between whales are clearer when you are closer. Being that close truly gives you a new perspective. And lots more questions. I wonder: Do whales have hairs on tubercules at the tops of their heads to sense when their heads have reached air? Are whales really just social butterflies who enjoy meeting other whales and hanging out with them for a short time only to move on to new friends shortly thereafter? Do lone whales breach and pec slap to let others know they are available for company? Is it really true that only males sing? At least one of the whales who mugged us was a female. Research claimed that singers attracted other males. Why then, was this singer with a female? So many questions.
9. 9. Floating in a tiny boat next to a whale can seriously alter your perspective on things. My last day on the water proved this without a doubt. When the water was crystal clear and almost waveless, I truly saw the size of whales, and I felt very, very small. Even the calf looked big, and he was a third the size of his mom. The video doesn’t do it justice. The mom on that last day swam under the boat a couple of times, and once as she rolled under the water, her fluke just barely grazed the front of the boat where I was standing. I caught my breath and held it for a second because I realized that if she had moved that tail just a few seconds earlier, the boat could have been tossed aside like a ragdoll, and I’d be swimming for cover. They can be formidable, and they can be as gentle as a whisper, depending on their mood. The mothers are so gentle with their calves. I could tell there was a lot of physical contact between moms and calves. Each always knows where the other is. By the same token, seeing a full-grown male exhibiting some testosterone-fueled aggression towards a boat as small as the Naiad, also makes you appreciate the nature of wild animals. Not a force to be reckoned with.
10. 10. I’m a lot more badass than I thought I was. Having traveled half-way around the world by myself to come face to face with the fifth largest animal ever to have lived on this planet, I feel pretty proud of myself. I was nervous about traveling abroad alone, but it hasn’t been bad. I confronted my fears and faced a lot of difficulties. I sucked it up a lot of times even when I wanted to give up. Despite the crappy weather and sea conditions, I wanted to go out every day and did. I did stuff I didn’t want or like to do. I met Mother Nature on her terms and came out the better for it. Now I just have to figure out where to go from here. Where will my next adventure take me? I’m not sure, but I imagine it will be some place where there are whales.

We saw a lot of pods today. Not much was new, but we got to see lots of surface activity. We came upon another mother and calf logging (or sleeping) just before lunch. We ended up eating our lunch with the pair just in front of the boat. It was a great way to enjoy a peanut butter and jelly sandwich – in the company of a mom and her baby. Just after we finished lunch, the two started to swim off. Suddenly, the baby did a big breach, and the mom answered with a breach of her own. They alternated, taking turns breaching for a couple more times, and then they swam off. That was pretty exciting. It’s like they were communicating their positions to one another or practicing how to communicate. You can’t tell me whales aren’t smart.

It was a great day over all, but as much as I love the whales, I kept seeing my kids’ faces out there on the water. I miss them a bunch and can’t wait to be with them and Greg again on Sunday. It’s definitely time to get home.

We all went out for dinner tonight at a local Italian restaurant. I had a delicious dish of fettuccini with porcini mushrooms. For dessert I ate chocolate crepes. Very interesting, but good. It was nice to sort of debrief about the whale experience at dinner. I really enjoyed my time at the research house and on the boat. It was definitely a once in a lifetime thing rating right behind giving birth and getting married.

I felt like my back, neck, and butt were broken after all the bumping and tossing about on the boat. It was almost as bad as our first day out on the Naiad. Very rough, very difficult, and not very fun at all. I was so tired that I kept nodding off on our way back to the harbor, despite being constantly splashed.

Tomorrow is my last day on the boat. I have a feeling that the whales will put on a grand finale for us tomorrow. We’re also all going out for dinner tomorrow night at a nearby Italian restaurant. That should be nice. I think I’m off to bed now.

Yesterday was kind of slow as far as whales go - I did hear a couple of trumpet blows from an angry whale, but not a whole lot of new stuff. Today, however, was a different story. We started seeing whales right away. All in all we had a total of 11 pods for the day. The highlight was around lunch time. We were getting ready to eat when we spotted some blows with surface action. When we made our way to the two whales, they took an immediate interest in us. They started circling the boat and popped up several times to blow really close. We were all really quiet while we watched. Suddenly I heard a noise. Annie at the same moment said, “Did you hear that?” We realized that one of the whales was singing! He was singing so loudly that we could hear it crystal clear through the water. As we looked around to try and figure out where he was, we realized that he had positioned himself directly under us and was singing to us! It was so incredibly amazing. I was shaking with excitement. The singer came up and circled us a few more times, then he went back down for more.

Meanwhile, the other whale swam around the boat and presented ventral side up. We saw that she was a female. Very interesting, since the latest research says that males sing to other males. Quincy said it was even possible that the singer was female, though we never verified it. The girl was beautiful, and she spyhopped us a dozen times within 5 feet of the boat (just out of reach, damn it!). I was talking to her, and she seemed to be listening as she stuck that massive head up out of the water over and over again. We turned the engine on to turn the boat, and I think that scared the singer because he stopped after that. The two whales disappeared for a while. We thought they had left, but they came back. I guess they just couldn’t get enough of us.

The two continued to circle us, showing us their bellies and flukes, and bringing those massive pec fins up (their pec fins can get up to 15 feet long, and our boat is only 14 if that gives you a clearer picture). When a tail would ease by us, it just blew my mind how big it was. And the heads. The heads were bigger than my entire body. I could literally see the whale lice and barnacles.

After that incident, I figured we were done for the day with good luck, but shortly after, we came upon a mom and calf pair. The calf was really little, and he was just breaching all over the place. He and mom took turns breaching. It was like she was teaching him how to do it. She’d breach, then immediately after, he’d imitate her. It was amazing. The mom was absolutely huge. She was one of the biggest humpbacks I’ve ever seen. The baby was nursing from mom just below the surface of the water. He was having the best time checking us out. Mom was a little protective, but she was not at all aggressive towards us.

Today was the most amazing whale contact I’ve ever had. The singer under the boat was so haunting and beautiful. I’ll never forget this day.

The weather wasn’t bad – cloudy at times and sunny at others. The temperature was mostly comfortable, although at the end of the day, it got pretty cold. Waves came and went. We started off with small waves, but they got bigger as the day went on.

On our way back to the harbor, I saw a whale blow in a very shallow area. I couldn’t believe my eyes. He blew twice, so I know it was a whale. Then I saw something large and black floating on the water, not moving. My first thought was that it was a calf that had died, and the whale that blew was the mother swimming away. I hope that it was just a log like Quincy said, but my fear is that it might have been a baby. :-(

We headed out early this morning around 7:15. The wind and seas were still pretty strong, but not as bad as yesterday. We saw our first pod of humpbacks pretty early. We saw about 7 pods total, and they were all interesting. I took down field notes today. It’s a little more challenging than using the GPS because I have to listen closely to the person taking pictures so I can document the activities of the whales and the contents of each frame.

Right after lunch, I spotted a peduncle slapper in the distance. He seemed to be going nuts, just throwing his back end up in the air and slamming it down repeatedly. Even from a distance I could tell how hard he was slamming down. When we finally got up to him, we discovered that there were two others with him. The three of them took an interest in us and “mugged” us by circling the boat repeatedly. They came very close to the boat, often blowing right at us (my jacket smells like whale breath – yuck!), ducking under the boat, and popping back up right next to us. Two of them pulled that maneuver at the same time so that one came up port side just as the other appeared starboard. That was pretty intense. When I say came close, I mean they were less than 10 feet from the boat. There were a couple of times when I thought they were going to touch the boat.

I tend to humanize whales way too much. I think of them as people. Today’s meeting with these three whales underscores the need to remember that whales are wild animals. They may be cute, but they are very big and can be very dangerous. The whales were playful at first. They seemed to be interacting with each other underwater and interacting with us as they spyhopped multiple times. When that massive head pops up less than 10 feet away from you on a tiny dinghy floating wildly in the Pacific Ocean, it can be both exhilarating and frightening at the same time. The size of the animals took my breath away. I was literally shaking as these guys swam from side to side and around us. And the sound of the blow that close up – not only is the exhalation loud, but as they draw another breath, there is sometimes a very deep guttural sound, almost like the deep grunt of a lion, that fills your whole head as it resonates. Massive.

I also noticed for the first time that when the whale breathes, its entire splash guard pinches tight as the blow holes close. There is some kind of huge muscle at work there that I never noticed before because I’ve never been this close. It’s almost like the whole top of the head squeezes together, not just the blow holes.

One of the whales presented her ventral side to us, and I got to see a hemispherical lobe (that’s girl parts) up close and personal. I’ve never seen one before, so it was pretty damn cool. She floated on her back multiple times. She seemed pretty gentle, but again, one never knows.

As the whales continued their mugging, we remained at their mercy. Mugging means that whales are too close for you to turn your engine back on and leave because you could hurt the animal. You are just stuck there until they swim off. Something changed about 10 or 15 minutes into the mugging. I’m not sure if one of the whales got mad at us or at the other whales, but he decided to peduncle throw his enormous back end at us. He missed the boat by about 20 feet, but it was clear that he was irritated about something. When I saw that tremendous tail (close to 15 feet wide of pure muscle) swish towards the boat, my guts crawled up my throat. Then he (or one of the others, I’m not sure) started head breaching right off the bow. I’m talking SLAMMED his head down in front of us. At that point, we realized that they were pissed about something, so we made to leave as quietly as we could so as to minimize danger to them and to ourselves.

As we drove away, I watched the whales in the distance. That mugger was still slapping his tail down for as long as I could see him.

Of course, I totally screwed up the field notes during the mugging. Annie was taking pictures, and somehow I didn’t hear several of the frames. I totally blame myself. I was too engrossed in what the whales were doing. Oh, well. We fixed it when we got back home tonight.

We didn’t see any more whales after that. It’s probably a good thing because I’m not sure my heart could take it. It was so exciting! Today was the best whale day yet. I hope the winds and seas calm some more tomorrow. Today was pretty cold, and I think I got wetter today than I did yesterday. Oh, and my hands got sunburned. Dummy me forgot to put sunscreen on my hands.

I hope we get mugged again tomorrow. :-)

The boat ride was one of the most frightening moments in my life. I was seriously scared shitless. With each wave we hit, my entire body was thrown upwards and then pushed down hard on my butt. Ocean sprayed every part of me. Luckily, I was wearing all of the foul weather gear I had bought, so underneath, I was warm and dry. Remarkably, I never felt sick. The motion sickness patch must have worked well.

It took well over an hour to get out to the whales on that bumpy roller coaster ride from hell. Once we found whales and stopped, we were at the mercy of the huge 4 – 6 foot waves that surrounded us on every side. I was in charge of making waypoints on the GPS to track the whales’ movements. It was very challenging to keep the unit dry – I kept sticking it inside my coat to protect it.

I learned that in order to get from the front of the boat or vice versa, you have to use the hand-holds on the outside of the boat and “monkey crawl” (as Rowan puts it) around the bobbing, often fast moving boat. It is incredibly dangerous because you are basically hanging off the side of a boat with no safety net. If your hand slips, you are going in for a dunking. I had to move around several times while traveling. Annie also spent a lot of time hanging on the outside so she could tell Juli where to point the camera for a picture. At one point, a humpback came right up behind Annie and dove under the boat right where she was hanging on. I got a little nervous for her, but she just blew it off. :-)

We saw a total of 9 pods today. The first ones were pretty quiet, just logging or hanging out at the surface not doing much. We eventually made it to some more active whales and saw some amazing stuff. At one point we had 3 – 4 whales circling our boat for about 15 minutes. They didn’t do anything, but they were watching us. It was crazy, like we were being scoped out.

Lunch was pretty quiet. We stopped the boat in the middle of the ocean and broke out our sandwiches. I, of course, had a Vegemite with cheese. After lunch, we took turns peeing off the back of the boat, which was kind of funny. Again, you literally hang your bare ass off the back end and hold on for dear life as the boat bobs and sways. It was an interesting experience to say the least, but at least my bladder wasn’t full any more. I thought I was going to burst!

The highlight of my day was when two whales popped up right next to me on the port side. One blew whale breath all over me and the other spyhopped me for a couple of seconds. I struggled to contain my excitement, but I don’t think I did a very good job of it. The whale actually popped his head up twice within five feet of me. If you think whales are big from a whale watch boat, you should see them in a 14 foot inflatable sitting really low on the water. Incredible! Amazingly, I wasn’t scared of the whales. I was much more worried about the waves and wind than those sweet leviathans.

There was a pec slapping party toward the end of the day with 3 – 4 whales just whacking their 15 foot long pec fins in the water. I could see those fins from far away, and when they hit the water, they sounded like gun shots or thunder. There were a lot of breaches at the end of the day too, but we were following another pod and couldn’t stop to look at the breacher.

Finally, it started getting closer to dark, and one of the nice whale watch guys radioed that we could follow in his wake to get back to harbor quicker. We took him up on the offer, but it was still incredibly bumpy on the way back in. Once we docked at the harbor, Quincy said that if she had known it was going to be this rough, she wouldn’t have taken us out. It was definitely a wild ride.

Every muscle in my body is aching right now from today’s trip. Tomorrow is supposed to be more of the same, so I don’t know if we’ll go out. I guess we’ll see how it is in the morning. Another day like today would be hard for everyone.