No, not us with the dolphins - we definitely don't "chase them."
Out on the boat again this afternoon. The discussion before we left the dock:
She: "I'm not taking any photos today - I just want to sit back and enjoy the ride."
He: "You don't mind if I shoot some, do you?"
She: "Not at all. Do what you like. I felt bad about all those photos you had to go through yesterday."
He: "Felt bad? I loved 'em! There were a lot, and I enjoyed every one of them."
So, we had a plan: a relaxing cruise, just enjoying the lovely weather. Oh, and...
;-)
We saw dolphins almost immediately after coming out of the canal on our island...
As she said, just viewing, no camera...
Within a few minutes, there were dolphins all around us again...
"You sure you don't want to take photos? I'm missing a bunch of these with this little camera?"
"No, I'm good just taking it all in."
We moved on from the couple dozen dolphins in the turning basin, heading for the ship channel. I was surprised that there weren't a lot of boats buzzing around. The wind had come up a bit, but it wasn't unpleasant.
There had been an "incident" at our swing-bridge today: a barge hit one of the pilings as it was passing through - snapped them right off. He had to ground his load and come back with just the tug to pulled the busted pilings out of the way so the bridge could close. During that time, nothing could pass through there on the water nor cars getting over the bridge. I'm guessing some of the fishing boats that got turned away there may have gone elsewhere.
Not a lot going on in the ship channel - a few dolphins and a shrimper heading out...
Coming back in from the ship channel, we saw a sportfisher and a shrimpboat coming our way. And, some more dolphins. "Looks like we may get some bow surfing..." That's all it took for Joan to grab the other camera. The few dolphins that were there took off towards that sportfisher like kids chasing an ice cream truck...
In a very unusual move, he slowed down as he approached us and the dolphins - we didn't see any dolphins at his bow...
He took off again, kicking a heck of a wake...
The dolphins played in the wake, waiting for the shrimper...
This is the area where the shrimpboats generally slow down - I'm thinking he saw what we were going for and kept his speed up; we paced him (yes, this pontoon boat can move out when it needs to). I could not have gotten these shots while driving - glad Joan decided to do some shooting...
If you look close at the image above, there is a dorsal fin heading towards the shrimper - just like surfers timing a wave!
Yep, they like to play! We paced the shrimper to the turning basin, then turned off - still plenty of dolphins here...
Heading for home, there was a flurry of activity: full breaches and a bunch of tail slaps...
Looking back at the sparkly water before heading into our canal...
And, some birds on our way in...
Nice way to wrap up the day.
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