Back by popular demand

So just after exams I started my job with Sealife Experience. I'm working Fridays to Mondays. I did my first weekend just observing and trying to learn. The office stuff was ok, like taking bookings and doing credit transactions. But the boat posed a bit of a challenge. You see, I found out not only would I be a guide, but because it's a small business, I'd be deckhand as well! Yikes. I didn't know much about boats and was certain I'd fall in the water before too long. It was inevitable.

So I did my training weekend, not falling in the water, and then did my first weekend taking tours (this weekend just gone). My first day was ok.. a few "deckhanding" issues, because I hadn't been shown a few things like mooring the boat, and I was just learning what all the ropes were for. But my commentary went ok. It's quite a long tour, 3 and a half hours, but really good value for what you pay. And it's an awesome piece of coastline we cover, with lots of seacaves you can take the boat right inside.

I've taken 3 tours now, where I've been doing the commentary. Here's what's REALLY cool though. I've had this fascination since a really young age (maybe 7 or 8) with whales and dolphins, which was more like an obsession, as my family would tell you. But I'd never actually SEEN a whale, even when I was out with the Sealife guys doing training. But on my first tour, we saw two humpback whales, a mother and calf. They were so beautiful, cruising along, maybe 200m from the boat. We cut the engine and the sea was so calm, so all you could hear was the waves slapping against the hull and no sound at all as the whales surfaced, until they'd blow. Quite awesome.

On my second tour, we saw a pod of common dolphins. On my third, we had the best day of whale sightings so far this season.. eight whales! There was a bull, cow and calf in Munro Bight, just cruising along. Then down at Cape Pillar, a calf was breaching, right out of the water! It had swam up to a fishing boat and was breaching right next to it.. the fishermen said over the radio, they thought it was going to jump into the boat. Would've made an awesome photo, the calf breaching with the huge cliffs of Cape Pillar in the background. We saw the calf and its mother again at Tasman Island, breaching again. Then on the way back, we saw three whales, slapping their tails on the water and just cruising along. We stayed and watched them for ages.

So God definitely blessed me hugely. I have been massively tired and it's been really hard getting used to this job for some reason, but I think I'll get into it soon. But seeing whales on my first day was awesome. Part of the reason I decided to study tourism (I once wanted to do marine biology) was that the idea of showing people God's creation appealed to me. And there was something awesome about how when we were watching the whales, we were all just standing at the side of the boat in silence, watching them, and no-one could've denied how impressed they were. Whether they knew it or not, they were looking at just one part of God's creation, and just the tiniest display of his power. If people can be inspired and excited by enormous whales splashing around in the ocean, how much more should they acknowledge God, who made them. Creation is inspiring but it's not great and powerful.. God the creator is.

So here are some photos! All are from Google, I'm afraid. Only the first is an official Sealife photo, the others are from who knows where. Oh and guess what else.. I haven't fallen in the water yet. Emphasis on "yet" :)

Here is our boat:


This is sort of what the calf looked like when it was breaching:


And this is a bit like what we could see of the adult whales: