Featured Image Credit: Peter Chai/Caters News
By Sarah Sharkey
Imagine a 30 ton animal showing off in the water near your boat. It would be a very cool thing to see, right?
A lucky boatload of whale watchers just outside of Sydney Harbor were able to witness a humpback whale performing a headstand just 60 feet away! Peter Chai, a tourist on the boat, was amazed by the rarely seen type of display of this humpback whale.
The 49 foot whale was a juvenile, and it seemed like he was enjoying the attention of the whale watching boat. Chai, a frequent whale watcher, said that he had only witnessed the extremely rare acts a few times in his life.
Chai had this to say about the experience, “’Humpback whales will sometimes perform tail slaps but I have never seen themselves raise their tail upwards out of the water like that. Usually they just slap it a little bit out of the water, but this kind of reverse breach is very unusual – they are very few and far between.In fact they are actually very inquisitive – you may see them do breaches when there are no boats or humans around, but it is not often you would see something unusual like this.”
But the juvenile whale did not stop with a head stand. He was breached multiple times, to the delight of the onlookers. It may have been enjoyable for the people aboard the boat, but it looks like the young whale was having a good time as well!