Sunshine and Seals
A Beautiful Day and Lovely Encounters
Another gorgeous, mirror-calm day out on the firth had us puffing our chests in hopeful anticipation of another successful day of sightings aboard Dolphin Spirit and Mischief. We were blessed with plenty of visits from seals – mostly harbour seals – around Alturlie Point and Meikle Mee throughout the day, which put us in good stead. The problem with seeing seals is that it tends to reflect the fact there are few or no dolphins around to disturb them, which certainly seemed to be the case. All things besides, our seals gave some excellent showings, including a spirited breach near the buoy and some up-close encounters which lasted for some time. The mothers-to-be out on the mudflats appeared in numbers from first thing in the morning – at least 2-3 of them were present on almost every sailing! But as nice as the seals are, we were certainly glad to stumble across some fins!
Pretending They’re Shy!
The 12pm presented us with a great surprise; as we came back down the firth towards the Inverness Caledonian Thistle Stadium, we caught sight of some very distant dolphins! Far, far towards the shore towards the retail park, two dorsals, one-pointed and one curved, peaked above the surface. Travelling in a leisurely, but still quite fast, fashion, we watched them track the coast in the opposite direction of us. At least one could be identified; the ever-identifiable Kesslet. Her companion was a bit of a mystery at that distance, but we think it may have been her son Charlie or Scoopy who was with her most likely. All three of them were later spotted at Chanonry then heading back down in our direction after 4pm, so it’s certain that they were all in the area at least. We got a heads-up from the wonderful Charlie Phillips up at Chanonry that an active group of dolphins were beginning to make their way into the firth our way, but we sadly missed them if they came down this far. Hopefully they’ll be a bit timelier next time!
One of the distant dorsal fins from the 12pm sailing