becoming a boat captain

At age 43 I knew nothing about boats.

I could tell you a lot about natural pregnancy and birth, natural remedies and treatments and my love for diving and the sea.

At age 43, boats were something far off in the distance, yet they were a means to get closer to the deep sea creatures and to exploring unchartered waters.

But by age 50 I knew a lot more about boats and the boating industry.

I learned how to skipper a small under 9m vessel and a 46 foot luxury yacht.

I became the marine asset manager for the luxury yacht, Playa, moored at Gordon's bay Harbour, Cape Town South-Africa.

Learning the ropes and working with wonderful crew members gave me tremdous joy and sense of accomplishment. Sharing Ocean related environmental knowledge remain one of the highlights of our trips out to sea.

Diving into every aspect of boat maintenance, including coppercoating, working with experts on marine systems, booking charters and seeing to the needs of the crew and passengers as well as getting to know people in the industry, was a learning curve I embraced.

Working with a team to create high, international standards of safety at sea is a big responsibility and an honour. A wonderful opportunity to the sea and share this experience with our community. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to Skip this vessel for a while.

On all but 2 cruises we were met with the local pod of sharp beaked common dolphins. This is a large pod of approximately 100 dolphins in False bay.

These dolphins enjoyed swimming in the bow waves and breaching out of the water, next to the boat.

We saw Bryde's whales ( Balaenoptera brydei) on occasion, even though they are very shy, due to the fact that they were hunted almost to extinction in the area by a man named Mr. Johan Bryde, a Norwegian who built the first whaling stations in Durban South-Africa in 1908.

Bryde's whales can grow up to 15M and weigh up to 40 tonnes.. The correct way to pronounce Bryde's whale is "Brooders"

Bryde's whales can be seen when small fish, like sardines, mackerels, anchovies and herring are plentiful inshore or in Fale Bay. They also like to feed off krill and plankton.

Bryde's whales were often spotted with Seals or Dolphins nearby.

They prefer water of above 16 degrees C.

Luckily for our Bryde's whales the Departement of Environment, Forests and Fisheries lifted the suspension of exploratory octopus fishing in false Bay and stated that " Should there be at least one mortality of any of these whales, the fishery will be terminated. "

The most recent documented death of a Bryde's whale in False bay was at pringle bay September 2020. The reported cause of death was from entanglement.

Bryde's whales have a smokey grey body and 3 parallel ridges that run from blow-hole to tip of the V-shaped snout. Bryde's whales have 40-50 throat grooves that extend all the way to the umbilicus. They have smaller, slender pointed flippers and a pale underside which may turn purple or pink during activity.

Bryde's whales have a flat head, slender body and slender dorsal fin with a deeply curved trailing edge, their tail flukes are black on top and pale underneath. They are not to be confused with Blue, Minke, Sei of Fin whales.

The 20km section between Gordon's Bay and Rooi els is an ideal site for offshore whale watching. Between November and March the chances of seeing these whales are quite high 20-500 m offshore.

There is thought to be little seasonal migration of the inshore Bryde's whale and the population is a few hundred (Penry et al, 2018). Indigo scuba divers often see Bryde's whales on their scuba trips, near Steenbras drop, Drop zone and Blousteen.

Whales were plentiful in the area approximately 70 years ago, before local whaling stations were established at Bikini Beach and Betty's Bay, where the remnants of the whale boiling pots are still standing.

Whales were hunted for their prescious whale oil, bones, meat and even nitrogen, which they are able to separate. in their system. Nitrogen was used for making nitrogen bombs.