SWIMMING WITH HUMP BACK WHALES, TONGA
🤩 Ok. This trip was crazy!! 🤩
It started with me being picked up by the hostel and transferred to the harbour. We jumped into a small boat and headed off. We drove for quite a while. Saw some whales in the distance and also a mum with its ca 1-2 week baby. We tried to ”catch” them so we could swim with them, but the mum was avoiding us, so we let them be. Then we got a radio call from one of the other boats and we turned the engine on full speed.The rule here is that there are only four people allowed in the water with the whales, so our boat waited 300 meters away from the other boat. When it was our turn, we came closer and jumped into the water.
This is when it gets interesting!
I was the last one in, so all of the other guys had started to swim. I slide into the water and began to swim very fast in order not to miss anything. When I arrived to the other guys they told me that the whale swam away. Little disappointed I swam quite quickly back. When I arrived the captain pointed back to where I came for and told me it was coming back. Quickly I swam back! When I was smimming quite fast I heard the guide yell ”come here!” I thought he ment that the whale was there (little did I know..), but out of the blue a giant whale came towards me and I needed to throw myself to the side to avoid it! It was so close!! Maybe a meter or so. I remember I was breathing quite heavily – the amazement, the size and the fact it was so close made my adrenaline pump.
It didn’t swim away like I thought it should do, except it turned and started swim back at us. I spent the time trying to avoid the nose of the whale while the whale seemed to want to poke me with its nose. Remember that these animals are huge! And they weigh several ton!barnicals on their nose could cut you and getting hit by it is sort of equivalent with getting hit by a car.
After a while the guide yells ”Get back to the boat! This whale is crazy!” We swam to the boat, and most of the people went up. When I just turned around the corner of the boat, I see the whale again! And it is cutting me of! I tried to avoid it, and needed to swim away from the boat. This whale was gigantic, and everytime i tried to turn around it i got further and further out. I could hear the guide ”Get back to the boat!”, but I couldn’t – the whale was in the way! One time I actually needed to withdraw my leg so it didn’t hit the whales fin.. When I finally could get around it, I swam. For the love of god I swam! You know the dream when the door is getting further and further away when you run? Had that exact feeling! I was swimming (didn’t have time/dare to look behind me) and it felt I was swimming at the same spot! Finally I came to the boat and I jumped right up on the boat. My heart was pounding and I was so out of breath. Have been swimming for a very long time (and remember the swim I did in the beginning?). After some seconds when everything come to me, I started to laugh. And people laugh and clapping. The whale was still swimming around, back and forth between the two boats. It was crazy! It was not aggressive, just very playful and curious. It didn’t get the memo – don’t touch the tourist! ^^
After I calmed down a little bit and caught my breath, I jumped into the water again. This time I hold on to the ladder, and was barefoot so I could quickly climb up again. It was amazing! The whale was swimming around, playing, popping its nose over the surface, rolling around and laying on its back. And I saw everything over and under the surface! Actually, we called it a he all the time until it laid on its back and the guide says ”Oh, it’s a female!” 🙃
The guide was swimming in the open and luring the whale back to us sometimes, but he said he didn’t dare to do it more because he was not in control, the whale was. One time (by the ladder) she almost hit me and another guy, cero respect for us divers – needed to pull my knees to my cheek 😝
After that we ate lunch on a VERY small island before we headed out again. We weren’t that lucky, but we saw some nice ”fin action”, blowing, backs and sound of them talking (sounded like a mixture of cow and goat 😆 ). Ended the day with a nice beer before the ride took us home 🙂
I will get some really nice pictures later!
