Beautiful Disasterpiece

ghost town

bodie, california

So, yesterday was unexpected and incredible.

I got notification that orca were heading south from North Shore towards the city, and I raced in to see if I could get ahead of them.  We hadn’t even stopped the car before I spotted the first one, which turned out to be a female with a calf.  I watched them for about 20 minutes, and my partner managed to catch a glimpse of a large bull just off the wharf.

As they disappeared around a curve, I thought about the next place we could stop up ahead of them, and we drove to the waterfront.  I was walking along the platform from the car when again, they popped right up in front of me.  This encounter was by far the closest as, soon after we arrived, a huge bull orca rose up right in front of us, a metre from where we were standing, and I instantly recognised him as Funky Monkey!!!  He gave us a number of great sightings and came up quite frequently within a few metres distance, I have to wonder if he was taking a look at all the strange figures whooping and watching him!  The mother and calf also passed right underneath us on the wooden walkway, and there were 2 more offshore.

They eventually headed off towards the Harbour Bridge, and we tried to get ahead of them again.  We managed to find them just the other side of the Harbour Bridge and here we watched them for the longest time, feeding and sleeping in the bay.  At sunset, their sleepy figures headed slowly back under the Harbour Bridge and I watched them until it was too black to see their dark silhouettes.