At Sea
Sailing in the Southern Ocean is always a treat and is always full of surprises. An encounter with a group of massive baleen whales is no less of a thrill as well, so when Tom made the announcement that there were whales spotted ahead and that we should don our parkas and head out on deck, the excitement level rose to a new height. Would we see them at all? Would we be able to identify them? Would they stay around long enough for me to get on these layers of clothes? The answer was YES all around. We did see them (note this photo from the bow of Endeavour); we were able to identify them (sei whales); and yes they did stay around us as if we were not even here. One even swam right under the bow of the ship – so close that it was too big to get into a photograph, but we soaked in the joy of the moment just the same. Sei whales are a baleanopterid whale (also called rorqual whales), a term which in Norse apparently means “whale with pleats in its throat.” They are related to the blue, fin, Bryde’s, minke and humpback whales, and we may have even had a lone fin whale in there with the 6 that we saw swimming about. In the southern hemisphere, sei whales feed on copepods and krill – small schooling crustaceans that are relatively abundant during the austral or southern summer. We couldn’t help but marvel at these 50-60 foot long creatures as they cavorted about, oftentimes exhibiting great bursts of speed – and in fact the sei whales have been clocked at over 35 miles per hour! That’s nearly 3 times our speed as we head toward the island of South Georgia. What whales and other adventures await us there? Stay tuned.
Sailing in the Southern Ocean is always a treat and is always full of surprises. An encounter with a group of massive baleen whales is no less of a thrill as well, so when Tom made the announcement that there were whales spotted ahead and that we should don our parkas and head out on deck, the excitement level rose to a new height. Would we see them at all? Would we be able to identify them? Would they stay around long enough for me to get on these layers of clothes? The answer was YES all around. We did see them (note this photo from the bow of Endeavour); we were able to identify them (sei whales); and yes they did stay around us as if we were not even here. One even swam right under the bow of the ship – so close that it was too big to get into a photograph, but we soaked in the joy of the moment just the same. Sei whales are a baleanopterid whale (also called rorqual whales), a term which in Norse apparently means “whale with pleats in its throat.” They are related to the blue, fin, Bryde’s, minke and humpback whales, and we may have even had a lone fin whale in there with the 6 that we saw swimming about. In the southern hemisphere, sei whales feed on copepods and krill – small schooling crustaceans that are relatively abundant during the austral or southern summer. We couldn’t help but marvel at these 50-60 foot long creatures as they cavorted about, oftentimes exhibiting great bursts of speed – and in fact the sei whales have been clocked at over 35 miles per hour! That’s nearly 3 times our speed as we head toward the island of South Georgia. What whales and other adventures await us there? Stay tuned.
