Posted by Sven G on November 08, 2003 at 20:01:31:
The exclamation point is there because I'd certainly never seen them in the wild. Beautiful, but glad I'm not a sea lion.
The occasion was the Santa Barbara return trip on the Great Escape today (8-11). It was a great Reef Seeker trip even before the Orcas and the Orcas just made it outstanding as Captain Tim and Captain Don gave us plenty of opportunities to see what must have been huge creatures. One male and two females ? The big one stuck around but the two smaller ones disappeared from view. My guess would be that the dorsal (?) fin on the big one was close to 8 feet tall, just estimating how much taller than a man it was.
Yes, the vis was much improved as well and the diving was great after two months of dry gills.
What a neat way to end the week :-)
-Sven