Fluke

The word fluke has a number of meanings.  There is fluke in the sense that a person may fluke a win at scrabble, just as David did tonight. Then there are liver flukes and blood flukes, which are parasitic worms.  Apparently, flounders are also called flukes, and one's anchor has a fluke at the end of its arm. But the most beautiful meaning for the word fluke refers to this:

Yes, today we had the privilege of being in the company of a large number of humpback whales, on a whale watching cruise like no other. The Spirit of Hervey Bay is a 24m catamaran that visits migrating humpback whales resting in the quiet waters of Platypus Bay, on the western side of Fraser Island. The whales seem to feel perfectly safe in this environment, they approach the boats and circle them, or swim underneath, popping up for a look. They are so close you could almost reach out and touch them. You hear the blows, and smell them. We saw at least six pods, some with frisky adolescents, one with a mother and tiny newborn calf, another with a female looking for company, rolling on her back and doing noisy pectoral fin slaps, and some with larger males who were doing spectacular peduncle leaps.

Some more photos, we took many, as you might imagine. Above, a mother with a calf.

This is the Spirit of Hervey Bay, a purpose built catamaran, equipped with water level viewing deck, hydrophone, underwater viewing windows, the works.

This whale came in for a close look, you can see its eye in about the middle of the picture.

Tail slapping is a favourite manoevre, this is quite a young whale.  The markings they collect on the underside of the flukes are used to identify individuals for research purposes.

The pectoral fin is huge, bigger than any other whale. This female was on her back and slapping both fins alternately to attract attention from male whales.

The blowholes open up like this when they breathe out, then close to slits as they dive again.

This whale's fin seemed to have been chewed. They also collect barnacles on their skin.

This move is "a peduncle" the whale dives and twists as it goes, creating a massive splash with its lower half.

You may be wondering if we downloaded these photos off some wildlife site - no, these are all photos taken by David, on our little Canon, today. I cropped the first four, the others are totally untouched.  It was an amazing day.