Daily Trip 09 April 2018

Guide Summary and Photographs

After a few days off the water and all anxious to get back amongst our wildlife, we were treated to an outrageous sight, a massive pod of Common Dolphins at least 300 strong. We set our course for the middle of the bay towards the animals, the shark cage diving vessels had also been graced with their presence on their way out also. Once we had arrived, it was an otherworldly scene straight from a documentary. We were right in the middle of the commons watching the breach, tail slap and even a few back flipped for us. The dolphins had been seen the previous day but this species in particular is known to be very fast moving from one spot to the other and it was only the third time we had seen them all year making it extra special. We were all completely entranced and stayed with the dolphins for what seemed like minutes but actually took up almost a third of the trip. Unfortunately, we had to move on with the rest of the tour, we wished we could have stayed there all day.

Our next stop was at Sponge bay at Dyer Island to try and glimpse some of our very endangered African Penguins. Luckily, we spotted a few free-swimming birds in the kelp just outside the bay, two adults and juvenile. We even managed to spot a few on the island itself basking on the rocks. To see penguins both in and out the water isn’t very common for us as they numbers have depleted around 90% in the last 20 years. The journey continued in Shark Alley and said G’day to 60,000 cape fur seals, on geyser rock which are always fun to watch both in and out the water. We stopped for a while at the seals continually passing parallel to the rock. Once more we moved on around the island, back towards the shark cage diving vessel to try and see the predator that makes these water so famous. We had to wait a little while, but we did get to see a bronze whaler shark. These sharks are rarely seen so close in shore but we did have a period at the start of the year when the frequented quite often. However, this wasn’t our last sighting of the day. Our way back to the harbour we had a sub Antarctic Skua follow the vessel some of the way. The bird obviously thought we were one of the cage diving vessels and looking for fish. It soon realised we had no food and moved on, wrapping up an unbelievable trip.

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