Friday 26th September

We set off in the autumnal sunshine on this morning’s Ocean Discovery with a light south-easterly wind, which meant we had a perfect angle for sailing south west. We picked up multiple gannet groups diving and decided to go to the closest feeding event. There was was a small pod juvenile common dolphins feeding alongside the gannets and fluttering kittiwakes . As the feeding broke down the dolphins decided to bow ride alongside us, with another pod racing in from further west joining in the fun. They stayed with us for quite a while as we sailed before veering off. We sailed in towards the coast to have look at the three seals that were hauled out on the rocks.

On this afternoons Ocean Discovery eight seals had decided to haul out in two groups of four and were happily snoozing away. We sailed out to a similar area offshore and found more gannets and they guided us to multiple feeding events. In the first feeding, there were no signs on fins above the water but there were lots of noisy diving terns we headed west and found another group of dolphins feeding. This maternal pod gave the guests great views as they bow-rode in between feeding. Arctic and great skuas were harassing more kittiwakes, bombing them into submission to give up their dinner. We watched this aerial dog fight as we turned back towards Penzance. One poor kittiwake was being chased by both and an arctic and great skua at the same time!