Near miss with a whale!
Viridian
Thu 2 Nov 2023 21:19
SOG: 6.8kn
COG: 200T
Wind speed: 2.0kn
Wind dir: 282T
Distance to go: 303nm
I was preparing to write my usual rather boring update on our progress this morning when we had a bit of excitement.
We were motoring along in very light winds and flat seas and i was reclining in the cockpit when a large whale suddenly came up for breath just behind us.
It surfaced quite close to us - about 40m behind the boat, and was about 25m long.
It was quite a bit of a shock because there’s normally nothing at all out there and seeing something so big surface so close to us was a real surprise.
It vented and submerged a couple of times and we realised that there were actually two whales there.
They disappeared into the distance and were hidden by the swell after about 5 minutes.
It was our excitement for the day, and I’m very glad we saw it, but I’m even more glad that they weren’t any closer and we didn’t hit them - a boat sank a few months ago when it was crossing from Panama to the Marquesas after it hit a whale...