‘They look into your soul’: How an up-close whale encounter changed my life
On a regular work day, Philip Hart gets to go where most of us can only dream of: deep below to dance with the giants of the sea.
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Suspended in the gently rocking blue, the sunlight pierces the ocean’s surface illuminating particles floating in the deep like snow in a winter sky.
Gradually, gracefully, a dark giant emerges from below, the distinctive white of its pectoral fins and fluked tail met with wide eyes, delighted gasps and adrenalin surges in the observing snorkelers.
The female humpback whale circles the group slowly, eyeing each closely. Satisfied there’s no danger, she allows her young calf to indulge its curiosity.
“A baby whale came right up alongside me and put its pectoral fin resting just above my shoulder. I was looking it in the eye, and it was looking at me – it was only the length of its fin, say two metres, away from me,’’ says a clearly awed Philip Hart.
“I’m looking at him, he’s got his pec fin on my shoulder, then it just moved the fin over my head and down on to the other shoulder – all the while looking at me, then it just gently swam away.
“It was like it was saying, you’re OK there, that’s alright, I’m just going to go around you. It swam over to its mother and off they went.
“I was actually crying; the emotions that well up inside you are unbelievable.’’
Just listening to Hart, 61, recall this experience is enough to prompt goose bumps of shivery excitement. Swimming with whales is a wildlife encounter he and son Dan, 31, have been offering to Sunshine Coast visitors for seven years, through their Mooloolaba-based dive and ocean adventure business Sunreef.
“It’s not an exaggeration to say being in the water with a whale is profound and almost life-changing,’’ says Hart, who had a successful financial career before tourism and hospitality. He and wife Susan, 59, also run a hotel and two restaurants in Melbourne with eldest son Jared, 33.
“You’re out there in the blue and the deep, the adrenalin is pumping through your body as you wait. You can’t necessarily see the whales, but you know they’re there. Then they appear in front of you and it’s like, holy (long pause) moly.
“It absolutely just takes your breath away when you’re right there, up close and personal. You feel like they’re looking into your soul. And it’s all so peaceful when it’s happening. It’s just an unexplainable experience.’’
The Harts were the first in Australia to launch the intimate encounters with the giants of the deep, inspired by Dan’s experience leading minke whale encounters in Cairns and after visiting similar tours in the waters off Tonga. They spent two years working with scientists, including University of Sunshine Coast adventure, conservation and tourism expert Dr Vikki Schaffer, to develop a code of practice governing safe interaction with the whales.
It was given to other West Australian and Queensland operators to use as a basis for developing their own practices.
“Vikki comes every year to work with new staff around interpreting whales’ behaviour, and make sure we know what we’re doing when we get in the water. Now we’ve got a few years under our belt, our understanding of what happens means we know what the whales are thinking when they do this or that. We continually adapt our code. It’s an ongoing learning experience when you’re getting up close and personal with them,’’ Hart says.
Sunreef has two boats, each taking a maximum of 15 snorkelers into the waters off Mooloolaba between June and October during the humpback whales’ annual migration between Antarctica and warmer breeding grounds in the sub-tropics.
Snorkelers are outfitted with a wetsuit, fins, mask and snorkel. Once whales are spotted, the boat stops ahead of the mammal’s predicted path and snorkelers enter the water, holding on to a rope suspended behind the boat.
What happens next is completely up to the whale. “If they don’t want to talk to you, they deviate off. If they want to come to you, they come to you – and more often than not, they do. They’re just as interested in us as we are in them. They’re a very, very, very curious creature.’’
In this latter half of the season, the whales are returning to the Antarctic waters with their young, often accompanied by “opportunistic” dolphins who are also partial to the whales’ milk – a pink, gelatinous substance expressed directly into the water for the calves to feed on.
“I’ve been on the boat when we’ve had a group of swimmers in the water, about a metre and a half between each of them on the mermaid line. This young calf – it wouldn’t have been bigger than a dolphin – came to the front of the line and swam zigzag between every single person. Girls were screaming in delight. It did another circle around them all and swam off,’’ Hart says.
“When they got back on the boat, men and women were crying. (Swimming with whales) is just an unbelievable experience. And you don’t come down from it for ages. You get out of the water and you’re like ... did that just happen?”
Sunreef Swim with Whales tours depart twice daily (7.30am, 11am) from The Wharf, Mooloolaba, until October 17. Limit of 15 per tour.
sunreef.com.au/whales/swim-with-whales, info@sunreef.com.au, 5444 5656
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