Whale Watching Tour in Newport Beach

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Whale Watching Tour in Newport Beach

Last Saturday, my husband and I went to Newport Beach for whale watching. We purchased the two tickets of the 2.5-Hour Davey's Locker Gray Whale Watching Tour from Livingsocial last month. Two tickets were originally $80 but were $22 with an additional $5 discount. I heard that the months of December thorough May were whale's peak migration season, so I was looking forward to this tour because I had had good experience from Dana Point whale watching tour last summer even though it hadn't been peak season.

On the day of the tour, we parked in Balboa Island and crossed the harbor by Balboa Island Ferry because we knew that it's very hard to find a parking space around the tour company facility. The tour started at 3:30, but we arrived at 2:15 p.m. there. We first went to the the tour reception counter and paid additional $7 for fuel surcharge.

I was expecting that it would be really cold during the tour, so I brought a down jacket and a wool scarf to keep me warm even though it was beautiful sunny day. My husband refused my suggestion at first, but he ended up being glad to bring an additional outerwear because it was seriously cold on the boat with heavy chilly wind, so those were very handy during tour. Some people were wearing light clothing, and they were freezing on the boat. I think that heavy outerwear is essential during cruising.

Unlike previous whale watching tour in Dana Point, we were not able to see any whale or dolphin for the first one hour. We just enjoyed cruising with seeing beautiful beach and coast houses.

After an hour, a group of dolphins swam toward our ferry. I was really excited seeing them.

Then, we were finally able to see some whales pretty close to the beach and pier for the final hour. I was surprised that it was definitely viewable from the pier, which we sometimes go to.

Whale Watching Tour in Newport Beach

     I uploaded my whale watching video, so you can see how close to the beach whales were swimming.

      However, we saw only few whales from far distance. I thought the previous whale watching was much more enjoyable. :P

      When our ferry got back to the dock, I saw these unique birds. Because I love all animal, I was very interested in them and looked it up on my bird guide book which I bought last year at Balboa Island. I was not able to find one in my book, but I think these were egret in Juvenile.