Sunday 14th July

Amazingly calm sea this morning and a pearly grey sky made for great spotting conditions. We didn’t have to go too far before we saw our first harbour porpoises, again including a mum and calf. We saw several more groups through the morning as well as several different groups of common dolphins. There were a few more seabirds around than there have been lately which was good to sea, including Manx shearwaters rafted up on the water. We also saw some bottling grey seals. On the afternoon Bay Discovery the sun came out and the sea breeze got up a bit. We found a very furtive few dolphins who we left after a few minutes because they were in a very “hidey” mood – always best to know when you’re not wanted! We headed south where there were lots of slicks of plankton in the water, but it was all rather quiet. Heading back inshore we had anther dolphin encounter and this time they were a little more sociable so we got some nice views of them. We also saw some seals, both in the water and on the rocks.