CALL ME REBECCA

Face to Face with Moby Dick

 
The phrase "once-in-a-lifetime experience" is overused and abused.  Last week during her diving Rebecca had the unique experience with angel rays.  That could have qualified as such a special experience.  But yesterday (Wednesday) Mrs.T had an encounter that truly warrants that trite phrase.  Here is the story:
 
 
People have asked me if I ever see whales underwater while I am diving. The answer was "No." You see most of the places we dive are shallow in whale terms, no more than 100 feet deep.  We may see them while on the boat, but never while underwater.  Alex, my dive master, has been diving the area for 25 years - he started as a teenager - and he had never seen a whale while diving, until yesterday!  We were diving at Chimo, one of the deep dives on the edge of the bay.  Alex and I were diving together maybe 100 feet down or so. I was just floating along looking at the fish when suddenly Alex grabbed me and turned me around. There swimming right towards us was a very large humpback whale.  Did I say large?  It was HUMONGOUS.  It was gigantic. It was, in Spanish, El mas grandisima!! And it came right towards us until it was about ten feet away when it turned and swam upwards. It came so close that I could see the bumps on its nose. Alex had a firm grip on me so that although I had a fleeting thought to try and touch it I could not. Although truth to tell, I almost immediately had a second thought that touching something that big might be a very bad idea.  How big was it?  A rough comparison had its flipper about the same size I am. Was I afraid? Not really, for one thing humpbacks are very friendly, and for another I did not have time to be. Was I in awe and shock? Absolutely! Why did this happen? I think maybe the whale heard our bubbles and was curious and came over to see who made them. Either that or God loves us or quite possibly both; we both are nice people. When we got back to the boat we didn't think they would believe us. Fortunately Tony, the boat captain, had seen the whale when it surfaced.  As soon as we got our equipment off Alex got on the radio and started spreading the news all over the bay.  "Y yo tambien!" I shouted, "Me too!"
 
Usually R puts in way too many "!"s when she puts her stories together, but this time the story deserves them.  Needless to say she has been ecstatic since her encounter – walking on air.
 
No pictures this time.
 
Best wishes.
Dan and Rebecca
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