I missed the great weather here in Bermuda this past week while I have been on a live-aboard boat down on the Silver Bank, 80 miles offshore Dominican Republic almost half way to the Turks and Caicos where I have been observing the humpbacks down in their southern breeding grounds.Plenty of whales and lots of very young calves. We also had wonderful weather down on the Silver Bank.

While I have been away Tim Card and family  (Tyler-age 9. Bryce-age 4 and his wife, Rachel) have been keeping a look out for the whales and of course spotted whales. Here is what Tim wrote to me on Sunday 30th January: 

"Took my son Tyler Astwood Park today for a couple of hours where we saw one tail slapping a few time and later we had one breaching ( 2 different areas ). I have to say that it is cool being able to do things like this with our children . Things like this I hope they will always remember doing with their mom and dad." 

I also received an email from Alex Hasselkuss on Friday 4th February:

"Hi Andrew
FYI, I just saw my first ever whale spout, just west of our house at Grape Bay!!  The spout was unmistakable (even though I've never seen one in real life before....).  Saw the spout twice, then no further signs of the whale yet...."

I haven't accessed my cell phone yet (I'm still in Miami on my way home to Bermuda tomorrow, and I'm sure there will be many more phone messages on the 77-SPOUT hotline with whale sightings. I'll add these when I access my phone messages and then I'll write a trip report about the week I spent down in the whale sanctuary on the Silver Bank.