WALES!

Now it took us 3 months of travelling to finally see some Whels. We had
been promised Wales in Cabo Verde, then for the first 3 days towards
Brazil, then in Salvador. It should have been their time. But they
alsways found a way to avoid us.

Marcus had never seen a Whale live out at the ocean, close enough to see
it is a Whale. I had seen one in Hawaii. Yesterday Frank, who up til now
also had not been blessed with seeing one, found a Whale out there.
Marcus and I had seen some blows before (also Sven), but we had not seen
the body that belongs to the blow.

Today was different. We saw the blow and the body, even saw some jump.
At first we spotted two in the direction of the oil platfrom. about 20
min later we saw them in 3 directions, farther aways but close enough
that I was able to take some pix with my camera and 280mm lens. They
usually came up (and blew) 3 times and then they were gone for a couple
of minutes. That gave me the chance to spot them on the first blow and
then take a picture of the second one.

So they did show us their backs (with fin) and the blowing capabilities.
Thank god not too close, cause the smell of the blow is said to be not
perfumed, but a bit stinky. What is yet to come is Whales showing us
their tail. Something to look forward to.

We were actually heading down from Morro south to get to the next
island. A southern strong wind front was said to arrive at this heigt at
3pm local time. Winds expected at 25-30 knots. We learned from local
knowledge that a wind that strong will most likely not arrive up here,
it will die before. It never comes up. Except for the exception, if you
know what I mean. Well, what can I say. It hit us at 0943 local time
(we left at 0530 this morning to avoid the wind), just half way down
where we wanted to go. Gusts up to 44 knots, 2-3 m waves and the wind
from the direction we were heading to, making it impossbile to move
forward in the direction where we wanted to go convinced us to go back.
Back to Morro. Well, actually, to see something new, we passed Morro and
motored on along the canal behind Morro and thrwe our anchor down at
Cairú, the town on the island Cairú, south of the insland of Tinharé,
where Morro is situated. You can't find it? Try 13°28,9'S and
039°02,6'W. A quiet, peaceful town with two wonderful chruches. We'll go
on land tomorrow - time for the photo tour.