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Mike Hannibal wrote:
>
> This inspection behaviour is something that I've seen
> a number of times. Once ...

We were off Terrigal once (S33? 27' E151? 26') early in the morning. A
couple of hundred metres away a whale was cavorting, throwing itself out of
the water, for all the world as if it was playing. Then it would disappear,
while we waited for the next show. The sun had risen a few minutes before, a
golden light between the clear pale blue sky and the dark blue sea.
Then suddenly and quite slowly this enormous head appeared (intermittently
spotted with what people take to be barnacles but are actually the whale
version of warts) and began a slow roll, followed by the rest of the body.
It was 10-15 metres off our beam and heading directly towards us.

'Ohmygod!' said Annick 'Elle va nous rentrer dedans!'
(She's going to run into us!)

Barely below the surface, the whale slid past the stern, seeming close
enough to touch. It was much bigger than our boat. The next sighting was a
few hundred metres to the north. Like us it was slowly cruising, part of the
annual whale migration in winter from the Antarctic to the warm and
sheltered waters off Queensland, to give birth and take annual holidays in
those congenial seas. I wondered whether it was so close to the coast (a
mile or two out) to avoid the southerly sweeping current further out. We
were convinced that it spotted us just as we spotted it, and came over for a
closer look, out of simple curiosity. As you do, en route to a holiday
destination.

   

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