Standing on deck and glancing over the sea you will miss most things. You have to focus on sections of the sea at a time. Using the techniques taught for watch observation you get the hang of watching and seeing unusual activity below the water surface. Place your eyes on the horizon and then gradually bring your vision closer to you, together with a very slow sweeping motion. Using the clock hands as your guide. (Bow being 12 o’clock) sweep the ocean between 10 and 12 o’clock and then repeat 8 to 10 o’clock, repeating until you have completed the clock face. Look for unusual splashes, the glint of fast moving creature in the side of a wave.
It is not unusual to sea a flock of birds diving into the sea chasing a shoal of fish. Very often you will find dolphins, mackerel and tuna in there hunting the shoal of fish at the same time.
It is very difficult to focus your eyes on objects in the sky. Whilst you are on a rollercoaster. The trick here is to do the same technique as searching the sea for dangers, but instead of going in one smooth motion from looking close to far away go a little distance away and look up, nothing there, look down and move your focus a little further away, look up, so on and so forth.
The easiest to spot are the flying fish. Once you reach the tropical waters these beautiful winged luminescent fish can literally fly from all directions. We find ourselves taking bets on how far they fly, or coaxing them to fly further. Their unfortunate demise is at night where their night vision must be as limited as ours as many end up on the deck perished by morning.
Before sunset you normally find seabirds like the blue footed or brown Booby birds come circling the boat. They come to find a roost for the night. Sleeping anywhere they can find out of the wind and at dawn they return to their day of feasting from the sea. We have had the same boobies, return night after night, hitchhiking along the journey.
When it’s dark and you have little or no vision you can often hear cetaceans as they blow air out of their blow holes. Believe me it can make you jump when a hump back whale blows right beside you as you are sailing along peacefully under sail at night. On hearing it you might be able to see it either with the naked or helped by a search light. If you can’t see and you can’t hear it, you may smell cetaceans. They eat fish and their breath is very smelly and if you happen to be down wind of a school of dolphins in the dark it is possible you will smell them.
But the most magical time on a night watch is when a pod of Dolphins arrive they must know you are alone as they tend to surf in the waves beside the boat instead of their usual place on the bow. Dolphins literally ‘glow' in the dark as they glide through bioluminescent waves. This is something that we would love to film for you all to see but unfortunately it doesn’t show up in the lens. It’s one of those special moments I guess you need to experience for yourself.
We hope we bring to you some of the amazing sights that we see on our amazing adventures sailing the sea. If you want to see it all in moving pictures check out our YouTube channel. There are a heap of episodes that have, dolphins, whales, turtles, seabirds and more.
Cheers R&K
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