Hervey Bay is a tranquil body of water that lies between Fraser Island, the world’s largest sand island, and the Australian mainland. It also happens to be the playground where 7,000 South Pacific Humpback whales take a little R&R on their 3,500 mile journey from the warm equatorial waters north of Australia to the frigid seas of Antarctica. Here is where baby whales get to practice important survival skills, such as hunting⎯“open mouth, let kelp flow in”⎯and breathing⎯“No son, you’ll never have gills like a fish, we’ve evolved beyond that; we’re mammals now; we have to go the surface and breath, keep the whale tour boats in business.” That may sound farfetched, but our bus driver said when new baby whales are born, other female whales act as midwives by taking the newborns to the surface to breath while the exhausted birth mothers recover. Apparently, breathing needs to be taught.
Whale Harpoon Gun Unfortunately, not all 7,000 whales show up in Hervey Bay at once, so spotting a pod of these mammals requires the hiring of expert sea captains (most likely former Captain Ahabs, who reengineered themselves into whale conservationists after commercial whaling was outlawed in the 1960’s).
Our whaling vessel, The Spirit of Hervey Bay, was outfitted with underwater viewing windows. 
Spirit of Hervey BayAfter ninety minutes at sea with no whales in sight, I began to think the viewing glass was a gimmick, that no whale had ever stepped a dorsal fin near those windows.
But alas, the captain finally found some whales, and for the next ninety minutes we watched the most fascinating display, much of which I didn’t catch on digital film because the shutter speed on the camera was too slow (note to self, buy single lens reflex digital camera). Hence, I have dozens of pictures of rippled water where a whale used to be. Here are a few shots where I got lucky and a whale swam into the frame just when the camera decided to do its t
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