My son is a whale aficionado and was not disappointed. The trip was a wonderful, stress-free experience.
The folks at Dana Point whale watching were great. Going out, I knew that we were at the end of the humpback migration season and did not really anticipate spotting any whales. We were on the 10:00AM trip on which we saw a sea lion munching on a Thresher shark and some harbor seals on the buoys near the entrance to the harbor, but no whales....but, as we were returning into the breakwater, the Captain received a radio message from another boat telling him there wa whale had been spotted up the coast. The Captain invited anyone who had been on the 10AM trip to stay on board for the Noon trip. We had the time and opted to stay.
Once the passengers for Noon excursion boarded, we made a direct trip to the spot where the Humpback was leisurely making his way South. We spent over an hour following the whale and got quite a number of good looks at it surfacing.
There was also the contingent of Dolphin following our boat and the second trip was well worth our time.
The boat has clean facilities and a bar for those who wish to have a beer or soda.
I would definitely take this trip again, especially for the price. The people in Puerto Vallarta charged us 100/person for the trip we took there on a Zodiak that held about 12 people, but it was open ended and they stayed out on the water a long time chasing 4 pods of whales.
I took my family of 6 on here last week. The boat was on-time and comfortable, with enough seating.
We had a nice trip out but the captain started moaning about how few whales were out as soon as we got on the boat, which didn't bode well.
After the two hour trip we had seen two whale tails poke out the water a quarter of a mile away. That's it. I appreciate this stuff isn't that easy to predict, but all of us were very disappointing.
I'm sure I read somewhere about money back if you don't see a good selection of creatures, but I can't find it now?
I'm just glad I got discounted tickets, or I'd be more annoyed. As it is it just wasted 2hrs and put us off doing it again.