Visitors spot incredible sight in tiny Aussie bay: 'Very special'
It's a tiny bay off the coast of Shellharbour, popular with swimmers and snorkellers for its protected, clear waters. But on Monday, visitors at Bushrangers Bay, south of Sydney, were treated to the arrival of some special guests — a pod of humpback whales who could even be heard singing from the shore to the delight of onlookers.
Alex Ross, a former local, was back in town visiting his children and grandchildren when he and his wife, Jenny, decided to stop by Bass Point to see if they could see any whales.
'We probably saw 10 or 15 pods down there this morning, but quite a few of them were off shore and then this pod came around just as we got there and went right into Bushrangers Bay,' he told Yahoo News.
The couple watched on in awe as the pod of at least three whales swam close to shore, in and out of the bay twice.
'Bushrangers Bay is a tiny, little marine reserve. It's about the size of maybe three Olympic swimming pools,' Alex said. 'It's quite narrow… but it's deep in there.
'They just came in and hardly had enough room to turn around in there really. So that's why I was quite surprised they went in there twice!'
Incredibly, there were several people swimming in the bay when the whales arrived, with one man saying he could hear them singing.
'It was the most amazing thing to hear their sounds underwater,' he wrote to Alex on Facebook.
The animals were so close to shore even those on land could hear the faint songs.
The rare sighting combined with their grandson's birthday on the same day made it a 'very special' experience for Alex and Jenny before they head home to New Zealand next month.
Whale season kicked off just a few weeks ago, with the peak time for whale spotting usually around the end of June and throughout July.
As part of their annual migration from Antarctica to the South Pacific to breed, the whales travel right along the Australian coastline — though you'd have to be lucky to see them this close.
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