Swimming with humpback whales in Mo'orea

It's nearly time for the big beauties to make their yearly appearance.

It’s already March somehow, and sitting at Temae looking out over the ocean, we started chatting about when the whales were due to make their annual migration through the islands.

Whale season starts around April and they can be seen until around October. Unlike many other places, in French Polynesia they still allow tourists to swim with the whales (with some protections in place).

Two years ago, we went on a whale watching tour and I had an up close encounter with a baby humpback. Here’s what I wrote down when we were safely back on land!

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We go looking for whales to swim with.

The tour is called Michael Poole’s Whale and Dolphin Watching Tours. It’s a boat with a crew of three, Dr Michael himself, Teri’i (I think that’s how it’s spelled) and the captain.

Michael is an interesting guy. Skinny with a broad Californian accent, wispy white hair and moustache, skin gone leathery from his time in the sun. He speaks French with the same Californian drawl (parlay view fron-say?) despite having lived here for decades.

He finds something to name-drop with each customer, depending on where they’re from. The German girl gets to hear about his stint on German TV (’Animal Planet. Did you watch it? No? I spoke flawless German’). When he finds out I’m from Melbourne, I’m told he collaborates with the University of Queensland and Southern Cross University.

The boat heads out beyond the reef. The water is grey and choppy. We travel towards some of the other whale watching boats, and we’re told that the whale jumping out of the water is a baby, and the mother is asleep underneath the water. She’ll sleep for up to half an hour at a time, however baby can only hold his breath for seven or eight minutes, so he’ll make more frequent appearances towards the surface.

It’s time to swim, if we feel confident enough.

Into the water.

Emile, Miri and I put on our mask and fins. Luckily, Emile rang previously to ask if we needed anything particular, and we were told fins were mandatory. Some of the others didn’t have them and had to stay on the boat until someone could lend them a pair.

I go off the back, trying to make as little a splash as possible. We’re told too much splashing will attract unwanted visitors of the sharkish variety.

Teri’i gets in the water with us, a serious-looking Tahitian with a pointed nose and silky black hair. The tattoos covering his chest and arms have faded with the sun. He has a bright red flotation ring that we’re told to keep close to and to keep together as a pack.

I swim, the sound of my breath loud in my ears. My vision is half ocean, half sky. In the distance, I can see the whale breaking the surface, but the visibility isn’t enough to see anything under the water yet.

We approach the baby, who’s rolling and frolicking. He disappears from view for a moment. And then, suddenly, he’s sailing past me, perhaps only 2 metres away. Teri’i grabs me and pulls me back; apparently, at that age, they’re not great at controlling their limbs and can be dangerous.

The baby is the size of a small bus. He moves gracefully, rolling onto his back, baring his white stomach.

His eye is big and watchful, taking our group in. I feel like our eyes meet for a moment as he cruises past. My stomach jumps. His expression has a wild intelligence that both awes and frightens.

Then I look down. The mother is underneath me.

If baby is big, mumma is… immense. The size of a house. A building. My brain can’t quite comprehend her scale as she slowly passes deep below.

She begins to rise towards the surface. I see her tail, the big, big fin of it, and imagine is flicking us high into the air. My heart thuds loudly in my ears.

But she mounts slowly enough that we’re out of danger.

The baby rolls in and out of the water, then mother and baby start moving.

That’s when Emile and Miri see the shark.

It’s circling below us, a grey reef shark. Immediately, Teri’i herds us towards another group of whale watchers. He pushes us into a tight group and stays on the outside. “Back to the boat,” he says, eyes dark and serious. He signals at the other group with a hand on top of his head, like the fin that so recognisably cuts through the water in film.

I see the shark. It’s grey and it’s big. It slices through the water below like a knife.

The other instructor is a woman with brunette hair. She gently peels one of her swimmers hands off her floatation ring. The woman looks at her with big, panicked eyes.

“I just need to signal to the boat to come and get us,” she says calmly. She waves the ring overhead.

The boat comes closer. Teri’i tells us to swim as a group. I try to swim as fast as I can without kicking the guy behind me (Vincent, I later learn, from Montpellier). I reach the ladder, slip off my fins and hand them to Michael, and climb up as quickly as I can without slipping.

Adrenaline pumps through me and I try to get my racing heart under control.

We see more whales from the boat.

Active babies playing about, the tail of a mother arching gracefully out of the waves, blue-black in colour, edged in white. The slick back of two big adults swimming side-by-side, possibly two males or a male and a female. Apparently the males outnumber the females by 50%, so it’s statistically unlikely to be two adult females together.

Elise, Vincent’s new wife, vomits over the side of the boat as the waves get bigger. The sea is dark and choppy, the wind suddenly cold despite the hot sun overhead. We don’t find another opportunity to swim. The whales are either moving, or the water is too rough.

On the way back, we bounce about on the waves like a cork. Spray soaks me and runs into my eyes behind my sunglasses.

I feel a bit like crying when I think about the baby, about his big eye, about the whole experience. They have a certain magic about them, the whales. I’ve tried to describe them here, but really, they are indescribable.

Reading, watching, thinking about…

1. Meet Me at Mike’s

I’ve been a long time follower of Pip’s cosy work, which has been going for an impressive 17 years!

2. Reggie the wombat

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I’ve started saving videos of Australian animals to show the kids here. Now my Instagram feed is full of high quality content like this.

3. One of my clients launched her website!

I worked on some illustrations with her, which was a fun project. While I’m taking a break from client work for a little while with the new baby, I’m keen to work on more projects like this in the future.