A word of advice: laughter - especially big, joyful laughter that stretches the corners of your mouth towards your ear-lobes - is not advisable when snorkelling. I learned this lesson while submerged just beneath the surface of the ocean in Vava'u, Tonga, frantically flipping my flippers in an effort to remain side by side with a magnificent humpback whale and her calf.The 'whale lady' who took us on this adventure had told me succumbing to tears is a common reaction - no-one had warned me about laughter. It bubbled up like fizzy. I could feel my heart pounding and my ribs expanding hugely with every breath. I wanted to squeal with joy. But being just metres from a 45-foot-long humpback whale and her baby when they're both serenely eye-balling you takes your emotions to a new level.
Twelve of us were on that three-day adventure with Whaleswim Adventures and its owner, New Zealander Rae Gill. The welfare of the whales is paramount to Rae and the guides she affectionately calls her 'fish' - so we're split into three 'schools' of wetsuit-clad humans. We're reminded to slip quietly into the water; not to splash and not to swim directly at the whale or her calf - a directive that was a source of amusement later, when the whale calf decided to swim directly towards me and my friend Jo. Through her mask, Jo's eyes match mine - bright, excited and growing bigger. I know she's wondering what this 20-foot playful calf is about to do. It deftly veers away and back to his mother's side. If whales can express humour, that cheeky calf was surely grinning.
Whaleswim Adventures skipper, Vava'u local Kam, has an uncanny ability to find the whales. When one of us spotted a plume of water arcing from a blowhole, a dorsal fin breaking the surface, or a magnificent breach in the distance as a whale exploded out of the water, we'd shriek, "Whale!". Invariably, Kam had already seen it, had already turned the boat. He drives beyond the whale, skirting around her at a distance and stopping in a spot further along her path.Look down!
By then, four of us have wriggled into our flippers, masks and snorkels and shimmied to the back of the boat, where we sit in a row - our guide in the middle of us. I can hear us trying to breathe evenly through our snorkels - and not doing it very well. "Go! Go! Go!" Kam shouts - and we scoot forward, plop into the water and fin as fast as we can, as he's excitedly shouting: "Look down! Look down!" Some of us hear him, some don't. But there's no chance of missing the magnificent sight of an enormous humpback whale.
Story by Victoria Bartle
Recently published in AA Directions
