Blue Whales in Redondo Beach

[WahooUSMA]

Very very cool!

[LakersFan]

Great shots! Definitely well worth any camera and lens cleaning fees.

[herefishyfishy!]

Thats freakin rad...

[Ed]

That was way cool. Great pics.

[Regor]

GREAT pics !

I've always been afraid to get too close. Thought there was a law, like not closer than 150 feet - or is that for a power boat?

[mo2vation]

Originally Posted by Regor

GREAT pics !

I've always been afraid to get too close. Thought there was a law, like not closer than 150 feet - or is that for a power boat?

But they'll definitely get closer than XYZ to you.




-K

[Hunter (The 80's Man)]

Wow, really cool pictures and narrative. Just got finished viewing it all and daydreaming with my wife and overly-priced-freshly-ground-pumpkin-spice morning coffee and Eggos. While looking on the screen, still dreaming, a fight in the living room over a Hungry Hungry Hippo game erupted with the kids.... ah, back to reality... which kinda' reminds us of an 80's song... BaCK to LIFe... bAcK to RE-AL-iTy

Amazing experience, truley once in a lifetime... I can hear the old-man-in-a-rocking-chair stories now... "AND THEN, THE WHALE came FLYYYYYYYING out of the water... RIGHT OVER MY KAYAK! PADDLE HELD HIGH IN THE AIR, the whale RAISED his tail to the surface gesturing back to ME... I snapped a picture, SEE?!?! "

Thanks for sharing,

Rob

[JoeBeck]

Great Pictures!! Brave paddle boarder. We saw a bunch of blue wales on our way out to Catalina middle of last month. I think they were in the same area. Nothing like being close to them on a kayak though.

[Seaangler]

Wow......proves how great our coast is! Thanks for sharing. That paddle boarder had a birds eye view.

[mtnbykr2]

Well I need to say those those shots tell the story that you will have for a life time, I probably would have been a bit nervous that close but hey, we are in their living room so if they wantto come and say hi, well that's their deal, thanks for sharing some awesome, possibly once in a life time pictures, well done...b

[hbdivegirl]

I'm the one that likes red so much.

Here's the deal: I wouldn't have been there, in that screaming red kayak, 4 miles off shore, with my most amazing and talented kayaking buddy, if it weren't for all of you here on BWE.

Seriously.

I'm at 36,000 feet, winging towards Seattle for 3 days of diving in Puget Sound, looking at these pictures posted on BWE.... thinking, "Not without you guys."

I was paddling a barge of a 'yak...just a horrible thing... until I paddled with Ken at LJS and experienced the worst boat envy in history.
Ken's boat: good (a real kayak.)
Chica's boat: bad. awful. hideous. slow. noisy.

The hunt for a better boat began... and Ken tipped me off to BWE immediately. "I know you don't fish, but there is NO WHERE on the web where you will learn more, from the real FHC kayakers of the west coast, than you will learn on BWE. These guys are the real deal."

So I went to school on what you all have to share.

PFD always on.
Hand-held bilge pump within reach.
Spare paddle packed at all times.
Marine radio, clipped to my PFD.. and know how to use it.
Vortex whistle attached to my PFD.
Real paddles.
Compass.
Water-proof lights in the dry-bag in case I'm stuck after dark.
Light-weight paddle leash, but never attached in the surf zone.

Ken and I talked about this stuff constantly.
You all do the most extraordinary stuff with simple gear and hard-won knowledge.
And you teach each other what each of you has learned.

So I changed nearly everything.
New boat, new paddles, PFD that fits, truckload of new skills, blah blah blah.

Suddenly I was heading farther off shore with realistic confidence.
Radio checks with the Harbor Master.
A plan in my head for fit-hitting-the-shan moments, if they should happen.

And I began having more fun than I could have imagined on top of the water.

So... when the Blue Whales appeared off shore, I was ready.
I saw the spouts from shore as I was running stairs, and I turned on a dime and raced home.

39 minutes later I was launching the 'yak, with all the safety gear assembled and stowed on autopilot, and I was blasting out of the harbor as fast as the Werners could shoot me.

Two days later, Ken and I bolted for the horizon and he shot all the amazing pictures posted here.


I would never have been able to be there without all that I learned here on BWE from all you generous FHC paddlers... and my amazing buddy.

"Thanks" doesn't begin to cover it.

~~~~~~
Claudette

[wiredantz]

GREAT PICTURES !~!!

[jorluivil]

Originally Posted by wiredantz

GREAT PICTURES !~!!

yeah, great pictures from like a year ago

Frank, again.....you must be extremely bored.

[William Novotny]

I am truely awestruck by those amazing photos. Thank you very much for painting such a vivid narative to go with them. Makes me want to go out with my nikon now. Where could I get a waterproof case for my D50?

[SquidJig]

Amazing post! Puts my whale photos and experiences, great as they are, to shame.

I haven't heard much about whales lately so I thought they had moved on. So I was amazed to see a whale watching company's whale/dolphin counts for the last several days. Yesterday's tour counted 63 fin whales plus lots of other species of whales and dolphins. They've been seeing blues, minkes, fins and humpbacks plus up to thousands of dolphins, including Rizzos. This was in Newport Beach, but I bet other tour operators in Southern California are in range of this super pod.

Maybe we SD fishermen will get lucky and this super pod will float down to LJ.

[mark kleiter]

Crazy experience! Those are giants of the sea. Awesome!