Cetaceans in the Sunshine!

The Terrible Trio Strike Again!
A glorious day all in all, with the sun shining for every single sailing that went out today! The wind from yesterday died down a little today, but there were still a few white horses to contend with, especially out in the Beauly Firth! That didn’t put us, or any of the 115 passengers to join Dolphin Spirit today, off though! We all went out and had a great time, and were lucky enough to enjoy another afternoon filled with dolphins doing their thing; hunting down the salmon running up the River Ness! On which note, we had a call not too recently asking if “we were the company that feeds the dolphins”! In answer to that question, or to anyone who thinks that, NO! We absolutely do not feed the dolphins, interfere with, or track them or any of our wildlife at all! Every salmon, every trout, caught by our dolphins is just as wild as they are! So when you see pictures of dolphins with salmon hanging out their mouths (like Kesslet in the picture above), that’s one the dolphins have chased down and caught themselves; and let us tell you, that’s a sight to behold in and of itself! But back to today; we had the troublesome two from yesterday back in the river, Kesslet and Charlie, but they were joined a little later by big pal Scoopy, who has been sniffing around the area (and Kesslet in particular!) quite a bit recently. Lovebirds or just really good friends? We’ll leave that for you to decide!

Hunting Happiness
Kesslet and Charlie were, unsurprisingly, the first to appear on the 12pm sailing, and what an entrance they made! Appearing just ahead of the boat near the ICT Stadium, they came alongside briefly before Charlie gave a cheeky little side breach behind us… right on top of Kesslet! Like a stern mother grabbing her child by the ear, Kesslet dragged her (somewhat big) baby off under the bridge and away into the river. With a laugh and smiles on our faces, we left them to it, hoping to see them again at the end. Luckily enough we did, and found they were not alone, as big Scoopy was milling around on his own too just at the mouth of the river! All three came together just in front of us, before disappearing off out again as we headed into the marina; Scoopy chomping down on his lunch as they swam up the Beauly Firth. The 2pm seemed less promising, since none of them were present or accounted for at the start of the trip! Thankfully, they reappeared and put on quite the showing with their catches right at the end, much to the delight of our patient passengers! They were still about at 4pm as well, where Charlie gave us an escort to where his mum and Scoopy were sitting just off Carnarc Point in the river. All three of them joined up when close enough again, and swam off out of the river in what was a lovely end to another 3 out of 4 dolphin day!