49 Bold & Beautiful swimmers can die happy now after the most amazing wildlife experience EVER !!! :-)
Swimming for over an hour with this magnificent Southern Right Whale !! WOW WOW WOW !!!
Emily Washbrook kindly shared these absolutely superb photos with us that she took from her balcony
What an experience of a life time !!!
It just kept on swimming with us, closer and closer.
At one point early on, I was trying to move out of it's way and dropped my camera - devastated is an understatement !!!
But... after about half an hour of the whale continuing to herd us it led Stephen straight to my camera and Scott the hero dived down to the depths to retrieve it - thank you, thank you, thank you !!! xxx
Did I mention this whale was beautiful ! It was the size of a double decker bus, magnificent, majestic, awesome and simply the best experience EVER - WOW WOW WOW !!!
Jane swam over from Shelly and was privileged to find herself swimming over the top of a baby Southern Right Whale, which didn't appear again, so I just wonder if the mother whale was herding us so the baby could swim... ??
Who knows, but it was certainly inquisitive and insistent on swimming with us, but oh so gentle. At one point it kept backing up until someone gave in and stroked its tail, then it seemed content.
It even got vocal at one point, making a beautiful gentle roaring noise as it blew.
It was truly a remarkable experience, we are oh so lucky !!!
There are also a couple of video clips for you to enjoy too:
One taken from land, courtesy of Emily, which you can view here
Another taken from land, courtesy of Simon Rosewell, which you can view here
Another taken (by me) from in the water with with whale, which you can view here
Eventually we were so cold we had to say cheerio to this beautiful social whale, until tomorrow that is... ;-)
So the motto of the story is NEVER MISS A SWIM !!! ;-)
Some more photos for you, kindly taken by Kathryn Shearsby as she was running past.
Enjoy your day. Somehow I don't think it's going to get any better than this !
WOW WOW WOW :-)
Thank you whale that was the best !
Don't forget, please come down 10 minutes early tomorrow morning as we have the camera man from SMH coming to photograph us :-)
Water Temperature 18.4
Air Temperature 10.0
Sunrise 6.53am
Sunset 5.10pm
High Tide: 11.53am
Low Tide: 5.49pm
To read Michael's tips on how to stay safe in the surf please click here
Some more photos just in, courtesy of Simon Rosewell
Thank you everyone for sharing this wonderful experience and all this superb footage.
More awesome photos below, kindly shared by Adel from Olitas photos.
