Close Encounter of the Third Ton, I'm Mister Blue

On 9 August, when we were sailing back from Catalina, we happened to come upon a whale basking on the surface. I have been sailing these waters now for over 37 years and seeing whales is not a too uncommon event. In fact, I have even gone to whale watching school at the Cabrillo Marine Museum in San Pedro, twice, in order to act as a docent on the local whale watch boats. This was no common garden variety California Gray Whale. It was way bigger and it had a "moat" around it's blowholes. Now I have seen Blue Whales out here but only at a distance of maybe a half mile at best. They usually sound, or dive, as you approach. We were under sail and as such, we were silent running. I don't know, maybe this big boy was snoozing on the surface but Heber, our trusty autopilot, stayed on course and we ended up on a collision course with this big boy. I eventually turned to port to avoid hitting him.

He looked like a Blue to me.

CPA was probably less than 20 feet. Damn, where the hell did I put my harpoon?