Cliff summed up the start of the day well in his previous post. As he mentioned the fog put a bit of a dampener on the first thirty minutes or so of the trip but when it did clear this wonderful wide open vista appeared before us of clear blue skies and a sea like glass. So different from the overcast and dreary conditions of the day before. A quick call in at Grassholm and then it was off to the deeper parts around the Smalls lighthouse where we encountered the Rissos Cliff mentioned. They were hard to keep track of but Andy had his finger on the pulse and kept them in view for us. Just before we were going to move on they gave us a parting shot with a few of them seemingly just as curious about us as we about them as they did several magnificent tail stands. Believe me when you see ten to twelve feet of these lovely animals standing on end it's quite a sight and I hope my images do them justice.
So it was a heading south for the next part of the trip as we cruised toward the Celtic Deep. We hit a few groups of common dolphin over the next thirty minutes or so and we were seeing far more activity all around us at distance. A we steamed further south at some twenty miles out we seemed to cruise through a corridor filled with dolphins as for some three to four miles wave after wave of large pods came to the boat and at one time I counted twenty five on the bow alone with many more surrounding us. It was dolphin central and I have to say it seemed even my camera was smiling. We turned for home and encountered even more pods as we came into sight of the haven and as if for good measure even in the haven itself and a good mile from the open sea I spotted a lone common dolphin a bit confused but seemingly OK as it passed between the refineries and Milford docks on the other bank.
All on board had a wonderful day and I was delighted to meet up at last with Richard Crossen a long time friend of Cliff's and the person responsible for putting this blog site together and also to meet esteemed local landscape and wildlife photographer Drew Buckley who's work I've admired for quite a while. Thank you both for your company and if you'd like to see some of Drew's images you can take a look here :- https://drewbuckleyphotography.com/
Please enjoy the following images from one of the best day's we've had out there and Thanks to our Skipper Andy for a fabulous day on the high seas.
