Sightings Blog

We had two Ocean Discovery trips today. The morning was still rather murky but it brightened through the day and we had blue skies and sunshine by mid afternoon. On the morning trip we were treated to an amazing porpoise display. As we head into the autumn, we see more mating behaviour and this involves…

The fog slowly cleared this morning – blown away by a quickly strengthening easterly wind! We got our first Ocean Discovery trip, though cancelled the afternoon, taking advantage of the window between dense fog and increasingly choppy sea conditions and we had a lovely trip. We spotted common dolphins feeding with gannets, common scoters (sea…

Visibility was hampered today by a persistent sea fog – only those living on the far western coasts of Britain can know the glumness of knowing the rest of the country is warm and sunny, while we have a southerly airflow basically giving us the Bay of Biscay in condensed form! The wildlife is all…

We had a spectacular day on the water today with awe inspiring sightings on both our morning Ocean Discovery and afternoon Discovery Voyage trips. We quickly spotted a big feeding frenzy of gannets from a distance first thing and as expected, underneath there were lots of hunting common dolphins. Amongst the gannets and dolphins there…

It was a long day with two Ocean Discovery trips and an evening Bay Discovery,  and there was lots of wildlife around to wish Josh happy birthday. There were common dolphins around all day, though we had to go a long way to find them on the afternoon Ocean Discovery. However we did find two…

Back out on the water today after a couple of windy days. It was still fairly breezy especially this afternoon, however the westerly wind was perfect for sailing offshore. This morning we very quickly found some common dolphins who bowrode with us for nearly an hour as we were sailing in the same direction they…

We had a Discovery Voyage this morning followed by a private three hour charter this afternoon. After the strong wind of yesterday and overnight there was quite a chunky swell running but the wind had switched northwesterly, so conditions weren’t too bad at all. In the bay first off we found masses of common dolphins…

Today the conditions were trickier than they had been, with a brisk southwesterly wind whipping the sea up into a choppy state. That meant the afternoon trip was shortened to two hours, but this morning we got the full three hours in. At this time of year, we start seeing more of the exciting offshore…

On this afternoon’s four hour trip, we saw the most amazing feeding frenzies of hundreds of bluefin tuna! Up until we saw the accompanying thousands of seabirds, things had been rather quiet inshore, so we headed off south and west. The seabirds gradually hove into view and they included gannets, all manner of gulls, Manx…

It was day of flat seas, hot sunshine  and superb sightings today. It didn’t take long until we found our first cetaceans, and there were absolutely loads of them. These were harbour porpoises and I’m not sure we have ever seen so many in the bay. They are even out dolphin-ing the dolphins and it’s…

On this morning’s three hour Ocean Discovery tour we saw our first big feeding frenzies of bluefin tuna of the summer. This is an amazing sight (and sound!), as the tuna rush around hunting prey, and making the water look as though it is boiling. Occasionally they launch themselves out of the water and you…

What a day we had on the water today. It started so calm that the sea’s surface was like a mirror. This gave us awesome through-the-water views of not only the hundreds of common dolphins, but also harbour porpoises. It seems that by this stage of the summer, the porpoises are feeding more efficiently which…