After a day of excitement yesterday we thought it was time to send another update from
Ningaloo... a whale calf was found at sunrise washed up on
the beach in distress with significant scaring on it's underbelly. ExplorOz member Hans, managed to push it back into the water and was pleased to see it swimming. I came across it later in the morning and with others we enjoyed watching it swim in the shallows at the shoreline but everyone was concerned for it's wellbeing as it would still require milk from it's mother which was on the other side of the reef but most people seemed to be content to let nature take its course and we moved on with our day. Unfortunately, the news at the end of the day was not good. Hawkers, boats, and snorkelers had interfered too much and the calf had not found it's way out to the reef and the
sharks had come in. Apparently a large tiger shark was seen circling the whale and the fisheries dept from
Exmouth were called in to take over and it was shot, then taken out to the reef and handed over to the research vessel Whale Song, which was been active whilst we've been here.
On a happier note, we had a lucky catch yesterday whilst retrieving a line we had out trolling and pulled up a beautiful Coronation Trout - our first catch of this species (photos on camera to come later).
We've also bumped into the Richards family from Bicton - Jacqui recognized me because we compete in the same age group in triathlons and we'd all been noticing the telltale signs of triathletes, with both camps sporting the latest model Spirit PRS570e elite kayak and a noticeable activity level beyond the norm for
Ningaloo campers!!
So life is good on
the beach and weather has remained ideallic, but we've only 2 more days 'till we start the return to winter.