10-7-09

today we saw two humback whales while out snorkeling. right when we were getting in the water, some of the divers and boat handlers noticed them far in the distance. i got out of the water and got to take my camera out just in time to photograph the mother whale jumping out of the water partially. eventually we got back into the water and collected data for a n hour. i've been working in the team that counts echinoderms with a quadrat. when we got back in the boat for cookie break, one of our guides asked if we wanted to drive out into the depeer water to find the whales, to which we replied in favor. for the next hour we tracked the mother and calf, until at one point we were about forty feet away from them. you could hear them breathing in and out, like tired elephants. i snapped a huge number of photos and gave my camera to rachel to snap a couple, as well, since she was in the front of the boat. the waves in that part of the water were pretty big, and i was actually rather afraid, seein gas how there were two gigantic whales near me and the boat was being tossed around.