Passenger Linda writes
Another day on the water although conditions were not ideal. Heavy cloud cover in Belmar and south, blue sky to the North East. Heading out of the inlet saw the Osprey and the Black Criwbed Night- Heron. Went North to where they have been seeing the whale all week, around the Long Branch area. Suddenly, notice the Captain make a turn and that usually means there is excitement ahead! Danielle, the naturalists, says they see a whale about a mile out and everyone needed to come off the bow while we were traveling because we were hitting some swells. This as we can see the whale breach! Then as we are traveling East, the whale breached at least one more time!. Finally we get closer and back on the bow and the whale was moving around rapidly at times and at other times seemed to be resting. Saw his flukes a few times. This is whale # 257 (I think) as identified by his flukes. Also he has the straight line scarring on his body.
We saw a pod of dolphins off Bradley beach on the way home but we were headed back to the dock . Everyday, every trip is a unique adventure. Think, 5 minutes earlier and we may have been right near the breaching whale!