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NEWT’s 2020 (pelagic) vision
It was another busy summer out on the North Sea, searching for whales, dolphins, porpoises and other marine wildlife. It was an incredibly successful season too, with a substantial majority of our sailings encountering cetaceans 🙂 Here’s a selection of images from early July to late September… We’ve arranged most of our sailings for 2022,…
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Triple crown; NEWT’s North Sea pelagic 07/07/21
Wednesday’s 4hr pelagic had a forecast that promised rain, although we only had a few drops, and it took just a few minutes for our first cetacean to appear as a harbour porpoise crossed the mouth of the Tyne in front of us. 90 minutes of intense scanning eventually produced bottlenose dolphins off Whitley Bay…
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Here come the dolphins; NEWT’s 4hr North Sea Pelagics 02/07/21
Friday’s back-to-back 4hr daytime pelagics both started with few dolphins having been reported locally, but a strategy of heading in the general direction where we think they’re likely to be paid off, with a wall of bottlenose dolphin faces charging towards us off Souter Point on our morning sailing, and the same off Collywell Bay…
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Back on the North Sea; NEWT’s 4hr pelagic 12/05/21
As we spend so much of our time on, or by, the sea it seemed poetic that as restrictions eased sufficiently to allow us to start running tours again, our first trip was a pelagic. The North Sea was at its ever-shifting best; lumpy swell and whitecaps eventually giving way to oily-smooth water reflecting the…
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NEWT’s North Sea Pelagics 21/09/2020
Our final 4hr daytime pelagics for 2020 were very contrasting. Our morning sailing was a great few hours offshore but didn’t produce any cetacean sightings so in the hour between sailings, I suggested to Allan that we should just head straight out in the afternoon…and just at the point where we were about to turn…
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Joyriders; NEWT’s North Sea Pelagic 02/09/2020
Wednesday’s 10hr Northumberland Ultimate Pelagic sailed with the intention of heading out to the furthest reaches of the Farne Deeps but just over 2hrs in, Mark and Martin looked at the weather and decided that it wouldn’t be safe to head as far offshore as planned. Checking the forecast for the rest of the day,…
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Northumberland Ultimate Pelagic 15/08/2020
Saturday was our first 10hr pelagic, after August 5th had weather that wasn’t great. White-beaked Dolphin put in an appearance early in the day, a Minke Whale was well to the ENE of Alnmouth and Harbour Porpoise were regular throughout the day. Amongst mist and rain we had some sublime conditions, extraordinary light and incredibly…
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NEWT’s 4hr North Sea pelagics July/August 2020
After a break of a few months we got back up and running in July, starting with our 4hr evening pelagics (and some 4hr daytime pelagics organised due to high demand!) Here’s a gallery of images covering a few of the trips where we found dolphins. 10 trips in total – 5 found White-beaked Dolphin,…
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Finale; NEWT’s North Sea Pelagic 14/09/19
After two cancellations due to pretty awful conditions offshore, our final 10hr Northumberland Ultimate Pelagic for 2019 survived the weather and fittingly, given recent changes in cetacean distribution off our coast, was topped and tailed by Bottlenose Dolphins around the mouth of the Tyne with White-beaked Dolphins in the Farne Deeps sandwiched between the start…
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Persistence; NEWT’s North Sea Pelagic 13/08/19
Our first 10hr ‘Northumberland Ultimate Pelagic’ for 2019 had Fulmars, Kittiwakes, Gannets, Great Skuas, Puffins, Guillemots, a little bit of rain, a long rolling northerly swell, dark skies away over the mainland and, thanks to Kirstie’s sharp eyesight, some very obliging White-beaked Dolphins just before the squally weather reached us 🙂