Advertisement
Published: March 10th 2014
Edit Blog Post
Part of our intrepid voyage within this archipelago is educational, and to this end, Queequeg and I are invited to attend presentations on the sciences of the ocean, ecology and of course Cetaceans. Here are some interesting things we have learned.
1. The Blue Whale is known by many names. One of these names is “Balaenoptera musculus” which means “whale wing mouse” (a joke on account of its size). Another common name is “Sulphur Bottoms”, (at which point I had to suppress my mirth, as this is indeed one of the common names I use for Queequeg) on account of a type of algae that grows on its underbelly (the whale that is, not Queequeg).
2. On account of a variety of factors, such as the exchange of cold and warm currents ie. convection, the Coriolis effect, wind, changes in density due to differences in salination and such like) all of these contribute to global ocean currents that flow around the world’s one big ocean (see picture).
It takes a thousand years for a water molecule to make the round trip, which means next time you look at the sea, the last time this water passed by
this way was around the time of William the Conqueror, the time before that will have been around the time of Jesus and so on.
3. Scrimshaw – is the name given to scrollwork, engravings, and carvings done in bone or ivory and typically refers to the handiwork created by whalers made from the by-products of harvesting marine mammals. Personally, I do not like the word, for it seemed familiar to me as if I had come across it before before I realised wherefore this came. It was of course from Eileen and Jason Scrimshaw, stars of Cetacean St (though you will not know of this as the device to which I refer is not invented for another 75 years).
4. Blue whales don’t wear underpants (and in this respect can be considered very similar to chickens).
But, before I lose the reader amidst a list of facts and figures, let us go back in time briefly to this last Friday night, for this was a night of great occasion on shore within these islands at the local hostelry – the Dark Pub.
We arrived at said quarters not a minute later than 7:00 of the
clock, primarily to fill ourselves with local delicacies and maybe a quart of ale or two. On arrival, it was to our dismay that we discovered that Friday night was also Karaoke night.
Curses.
But, to call it Karaoke is to be misleading in the most, for I would liken it more to a local Portuguese version of the X-Factor (something else of which you will not know for the said device does still not yet exist) – let us call it the P-Factor.
There were judges, and there were contestants, and the grand prize was for the lucky winner to have the chance to sign with a famous Portuguese pop-minstrel. We tarried awhile for the sake of curiosity, and as is always the way with these things, what started out as an exercise in scorn was soon forgotten as the ale flowed freely and we were soon to be found whooping with joy and encouragement for the brave contestants.
At the end of the contest (3:00am – we had been drinking for 8 hours), all the contestants stood in a line and one of the judges stood up and gave a long speech, albeit in
the local dialect which was lost on both Sulphur Bottoms and I. To this end, I approached another of the judges and asked them (after checking we could speak a common language) who the winner was.
“All of them”, came the reply.
“All of them?”, I enquired.
“Si, all of them”.
I still know not of the rule and regulations that fashion this place, but suffice it to say that we cared not a toss and happily made our way back to our home for the evening.
Of course, after such an evening of revelry as this, our sleeping habits were somewhat more disturbed that usual and for some reason, I found myself rotated 180 degrees within my bed, such that my feet were on my pillow, heels pointed towards Sulphur Bottoms’ face. I awoke in the middle of the night to a strange sensation, as if some invisible tentacles were exploring my very heel - an octopus or squid or some such creature?
But it was none other than Sulphur Bottoms himself.
“Queequeg”, I started, “what are you doing?”.
“I am sorry”, he replied, “but I could not work out what
was wrong with your face and was wondering why your nose was so large and leathery”.
More wheezing ensued.
But, back to the moment.
Yesterday there was rumour of baleens 10 miles off shore and we scrambled down to the port to chase down the leviathan. It took us about an hour and 15 minutes to get to the correct zone as highlighted by the Vagia, and to our surprise we were met by a huge adult bull sperm whale. Sperm whales can hold their breath for over an hour and dive to depths of 1000m to feed on squid. The Vagia had sighted him as he dove for feeding, radioed ahead (another mystery device that will not exist for 30 years) and we arrived just as he surfaced again.
We tracked him for a while until he dove again, then returned, spotting turtles and dolphins along the return journey. Sadly no baleens, but hey, this will do.
Which brings us to this very moment.
Today (Monday) is our last full day on Pico (we leave tomorrow for another island – Terceira) and so our last chance for spotting baleens. Sea is calm, visibility
is good, but so far, no baleens, we are on standby.
But, we have had our money’s worth it has to be said and have no complaints (except perhaps for the grumpy old fisherman who threatened to kill us, though it has to be said, most amusing in retrospect).
Advertisement
Tot: 0.072s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 9; qc: 49; dbt: 0.0347s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb