# No shortage of whales on Maui



## artringwald (Mar 1, 2016)

We went out on Pacific Whale Foundation's Ocean Discovery, a powered catamaran out of Lahaina. It was only 5 minutes before we started seeing groups of whales. The males kept banging and shoving each other just like teenagers competing for a girl. DW caught one of them trying to land on top of another about 50 yards from the boat.


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## Polly Metallic (Mar 1, 2016)

Great photo! Looking forward to our trip next February!


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## DaveNV (Mar 1, 2016)

I heard they sighted two whales inside Pearl Harbor yesterday.

Dave


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## willowglener (Mar 1, 2016)

Thank you for the confirmation. I am going in 10 days. I'm thinking about going on a zodiac with Ultimate Whale Watch. Can't wait!!!!!


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## taffy19 (Mar 1, 2016)

That's what we are going to do too.  We really like them and can hardly wait.


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## slip (Mar 1, 2016)

Great shot!! We saw some on Captain Andys yesterday but not like that!


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## eakhat (Mar 1, 2016)

Amazing photo!


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## taffy19 (Mar 1, 2016)

artringwald said:


> We went out on Pacific Whale Foundation's Ocean Discovery, a powered catamaran out of Lahaina. It was only 5 minutes before we started seeing groups of whales. The males kept banging and shoving each other just like teenagers competing for a girl. DW caught one of them trying to land on top of another about 50 yards from the boat.


Great photo and I like your signature slogan but Maui has the most whales because it has shallow water protected by another island.


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## Luanne (Mar 1, 2016)

Good to hear.  I have "friended" Pacific Whale Foundation on Facebook so I'm getting great photos from them.

Some neighbors are on Maui right now, and our dd and sil are going to be there in a few weeks. I know they are both planning on going out with Pacific Whale Foundation.


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## artringwald (Mar 1, 2016)

iconnections said:


> Great photo and I like your signature slogan but Maui has the most whales because it has shallow water protected by another island.



Kauai and Maui both seem to be good places to see whales from the shore, but for boat trips, Maui nō ka ʻoi (Maui is the best). The past couple of years when we've taken boat tours on Maui it's been like whale soup.


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## artringwald (Mar 1, 2016)

Here's another on. I title it "I think they're going to need a bigger boat."


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## Denise L (Mar 2, 2016)

Such nice photos !

We saw a calf and its mama and its pilot whale on our Trilogy Whale Watch trip last month.  We were supposed to board on Ka'anapali Beach but the location was changed to Lahaina Harbor due to extreme
wind that day.  

It was peaceful where we ended up going.  Lots of tails and fins but no breaching.


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## artringwald (Mar 2, 2016)

We saw some more whales while enjoying a delicious dinner at Duke's Beach House in Kaanapali. Didn't get any pictures of the whales, but did get a nice sunset picture from our table.


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## Southerngirl528 (Mar 2, 2016)

Awesome photos of those amazing cetaceans, Artringwald! Mahalo for sharing them with us!

iconnections is correct that the Au'au Channel between the leeward coasts of Maui with Lana'i to the west, Moloka'i to the north and Kaho'olawe to the south makes for a very protected area that mama whales are very drawn toward. It makes for spectacular whale watching in season and is one of the main reasons we love our trips to Maui in Jan/Feb.

For anyone heading to Hawaii and especially Maui in whale season, be sure to take binoculars with you as this can make your whale watching from shore especially fun! Thanks again, Art!!


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## artringwald (Mar 2, 2016)

Southerngirl528 said:


> Awesome photos of those amazing cetaceans, Artringwald! Mahalo for sharing them with us!
> 
> iconnections is correct that the Au'au Channel between the leeward coasts of Maui with Lana'i to the west, Moloka'i to the north and Kaho'olawe to the south makes for a very protected area that mama whales are very drawn toward. It makes for spectacular whale watching in season and is one of the main reasons we love our trips to Maui in Jan/Feb.
> 
> For anyone heading to Hawaii and especially Maui in whale season, be sure to take binoculars with you as this can make your whale watching from shore especially fun! Thanks again, Art!!



We did see some mamas with their babies too. The babies are growing fast, getting ready for the long trip back to Alaska.


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## Luanne (Mar 2, 2016)

artringwald said:


> We did see some mamas with their babies too. The babies are growing fast, getting ready for the long trip back to Alaska.



We were on Maui last March.  The coolest thing we saw on one of our whale watch trips was a mama teaching her baby to breech.  They came up not just once, but several times in a row....first mama, then the baby.


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## artringwald (Mar 2, 2016)

Luanne said:


> We were on Maui last March.  The coolest thing we saw on one of our whale watch trips was a mama teaching her baby to breech.  They came up not just once, but several times in a row....first mama, then the baby.



Love it! Practice, practice, practice.


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## DaveNV (Mar 2, 2016)

artringwald said:


> We saw some more whales while enjoying a delicious dinner at Duke's Beach House in Kaanapali. Didn't get any pictures of the whales, but did get a nice sunset picture from our table.



Nice picture, Art!


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## clifffaith (Mar 2, 2016)

Anyone know if the Pacific Whale Foundation does a whale watching trip on "real boats"?  No wading in the water to get on to a boat, no being put in a raft in the waves leaving us wet from the waist down when disembarking.  Been there, will never do it again, but would like to go back out on the water later this month to see the whales up close.


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## Luanne (Mar 2, 2016)

clifffaith said:


> Anyone know if the Pacific Whale Foundation does a whale watching trip on "real boats"?  No wading in the water to get on to a boat, no being put in a raft in the waves leaving us wet from the waist down when disembarking.  Been there, will never do it again, but would like to go back out on the water later this month to see the whales up close.



Absolutely they do them on "real" boats.  Those are the type of whale watches we go on.

http://www.pacificwhale.org/content/meet-our-vessels






And just a tip, if you sign up for a tour on their website you get a discount.


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## clifffaith (Mar 2, 2016)

Thanks, Luanne!  The concierge at the Westin and everyone in listening distance got an earful from me after our first whale watch about 6 years ago.  We'd even gone the day before to Whaler's Village to see how a "wet boarding" worked -- I was heartened to see them lead 80 year old ladies out to the boats and figured I could manage.  But the waves were real high the next day and they couldn't disembark people close to shore so they put us in rafts and then rammed us on shore with water crashing all over us and our belongings. I was PO'd and mortified to literally have kids pointing at us as we made our way to the bus stop to go back to our lodging.  I pity the person who sat in our seats after us because they certainly got wet if they sat where we'd been.  Faith


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## Luanne (Mar 2, 2016)

clifffaith said:


> Thanks, Luanne!  The concierge at the Westin and everyone in listening distance got an earful from me after our first whale watch about 6 years ago.  We'd even gone the day before to Whaler's Village to see how a "wet boarding" worked -- I was heartened to see them lead 80 year old ladies out to the boats and figured I could manage.  But the waves were real high the next day and they couldn't disembark people close to shore so they put us in rafts and then rammed us on shore with water crashing all over us and our belongings. I was PO'd and mortified to literally have kids pointing at us as we made our way to the bus stop to go back to our lodging.  I pity the person who sat in our seats after us because they certainly got wet if they sat where we'd been.  Faith



If you go to their website you can see which ships leave out of which harbor.  We've always gone out of Maalaea Harbor.


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## AKE (Mar 2, 2016)

We were in Maui last week and went on 3 whale-watching trips out of Lahaina Harbour (2 on Ultimate in the afternoon on the 18 passenger rafts and one on the PWF cat early morning).  All trips were like being in whale soup.  At one point we had groups of whales on both sides as well as behind - it was hard to know where to look as there was everything from mommy with baby and multiple escorts jockeying for the prime position to loners, stragglers and just groups of males 'grandstanding'.


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## artringwald (Mar 2, 2016)

Luanne said:


> Absolutely they do them on "real" boats.  Those are the type of whale watches we go on.
> 
> http://www.pacificwhale.org/content/meet-our-vessels
> 
> ...



The one in the picture is Pacific Whale Foundation's Ocean Discovery, a powered catamaran. We went on it this year because it's big and our friend is prone to sea sickness. She took Dramamine the night before and was fine, although the waters were calm. Our favorite way to see whales was on the America II, a modified America's Cup sailing boat. Unfortunately, the owner died and it's no longer sailing out of Lahaina.  A similar experience might be the Scotch Mist, but we haven't tried it yet. There's nothing like a sleek sailing boat slicing though the water with whales all around.

Here's a picture from 2012:


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## kalima (Mar 3, 2016)

*Awesome pics!*

I have booked the same company for the snorkel trip over the crater. Really looking forward to it but it's not until December...barbecued lunch on board, couple drinks afterwards on board while going back to shore...apparently they are a very educational tour company recommended to me by a friend. I have booked our trip with them already so that I don't get talked into an update when we go!! :whoopie:


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