More like the Southern "Write a blog post" Whale

A touristy moment. Last weekend, some of the interns in my program drove out to Hermanus, a small harbor town about an hour from Cape Town. The big thing that draws tourists to Hermanus this time of the year, beside a pretty dazzling view of ocean-slash-mountains-slash-sky, is the whales. It’s mating season for the Southern Right Whales, which hang out fairly close to shore. I’ve seen photos of one within a foot of someone standing on an outcropping, and hanging out on any oceanside veranda in Hermanus for a few hours will pretty much guarantee you a sighting.



So we hopped on a boat and went chasing after some whales. The Southern right whale was so named because, like the dodo, it has an unfortunately placid/friendly/curious nature that made it the “right” whale to hunt in the southern seas. It also is very rich in blubber, perhaps because it feeds in the very cold Antarctic waters four months of the year. As a result, it was nearly depleted by the time whaling was banned in 1937. Good for tourists, though, because our boat got extremely close to several whales, mostly young males, and were even ourselves investigated by a few.




At one point we found a group of three – two males, both of whom were courting a reluctant female. The female lay motionless on her back to signal disinterest, occasionally flopping over for air, while the males circled around her and occasionally tried to give her a belly rub with their fins. Cute. Eventually they gave up and settled for ordering a pizza and playing video games.