After several days of big swells, today’s calm was a pleasant surprise, as Captain Rod took the Pacifica out west. Once we hit the edge of the Monterey Submarine Canyon, we found a massive group of roughly 600 Risso’s Dolphin, with about 200 Pacific White Sided Dolphin and a handful of Northern Right Whale Dolphin. We watched them for a long time, as it was so hard to leave (they all gave us such great looks), but eventually we made our way north, to find several groups of humpback whale (8 in all). Our second trip lacked the dolphin, but made up for it with a pair of mega-breaching humpback whales. Breach after breach, our high flying humpbacks put on quite the show for the entirety of the trip, until the wind picked up and sloppy seas sent us home right on time.
-Naturalist Isaiah
