Dick made the comment in the title of this post as we were surrounded by humpbacks; he said he’d heard one of the guides use the phrase last week. It was most appropriate this evening.

It was now 6:20pm, and no one was thinking about dinner.  We watched the line of humpbacks, not sure how many there really were; Three? Four? Five?  At times, maybe six.

Oops, there’s one close to the ship:

Remembering to check out the scenery, and not just the whale show:

We also saw a barge toting boats, trucks, and other goods – probably the only option for some, since so many areas in Alaska are not connected by roads:

One thing that stood out about this evening’s adventure was how often we saw at least two whales close together.  At times, it looked like they were playing follow-the-leader.

It was time to go in for a quick bite to eat, and then hurry back outside.  Another quick look at the mountains and the blows against the shoreline:

Wait a minute?  What’s that?  Ha!  You didn’t get away this time:

Let’s straighten you up:

We kept scanning for another breach – sometimes a humpback will breach more than once – and rarely more than a hundred times! That didn’t happen, but that’s okay.  Scientists don’t know for sure why whales breach – it may be to wash off parasites, to communicate, or just because they’re feeling frisky.

We enjoyed the next hour watching the fun.  And, in case you’re wondering, I did put the camera down every so often to just enjoy the sights.  A few more photos:

At 8pm, we saw the Island Princess arriving.  They were late to the party, but maybe they’d seen whales elsewhere, since there seemed to be so many.

No time to worry about the cruise ship, we had more buddy activity to watch:

The Island Princess came close enough so we could see they were watching the new Disney “Oz” movie on their big screen. There weren’t a lot of people out on deck or at their balconies.  One good thing about this interruption – Lou said we did get a cell phone signal while they were in the vicinity.

It was almost 9pm when we said good night to both the Island Princess and the whales.

A goodnight shot from the last dynamic duo of the evening:

Another day exceeds expectations! Thank you, Lou – this has been the best birthday present ever.

I went to bed with visions of leaping whales …