Baby bump! Incredible moment a playful humpback calf nudges a kayaker as it breached off Hawaii
- Marcy Koltun-Crilley was kayaking in Hawaii when she spotted two whales and started filming them
- Amazing underwater footage from the 63-year-old’s GoPro shows a humpback whale mother and calf
- Baby humpback whale then breaches the surface and playfully bumps her kayak before swimming off
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A stunned kayaker captured her ‘magical’ close encounter with a ‘very curious’ whale and her baby humpback calf – as it even knocked into her as it breached.
Marcy Koltun-Crilley, 63, was paddling a mile off Kihei, Hawaii when she spotted something very big swimming below her vessel and decided to take a closer look.
The retired nurse realised she had also been joined by some humpback whales and plunged her GoPro into the crystal clear waters.
Marcy Koltun-Crilley, 63, was kayaking in Hawaii when she spotted two humpback whales, a mother and her calf, and she and plunged her GoPro into the crystal clear waters
Incredible footage shows the inquisitive baby calf leaving its mother and swimming towards the surface straight to her boat
It playfully bumped into her kayak as it breached the surface, causing Marcy’s boat to rock back and forth
Incredible footage, hailed as ‘magical’ online, shows two of the whales below her before the inquisitive baby calf leaves its mother and swims towards the surface.
The calf playfully bumps into Marcy’s kayak at the very last moment and breaks the surface of the water right next to her.
Its 15-foot-long body knocks Marcy’s boat causing it to rock as she balanced herself.
Having narrowly avoided being flipped over by its tail, Marcy was then joined by the whales for a total of two hours as they swam around her.
She said the baby whale was about 15-foot-long and was ‘so friendly and playful’
Marcy said: ‘The baby came right at me, I thought it was going to climb into my boat!
‘At the last second, it went under my kayak and rubbed against it and then popped up on the other side with the Mom below her.
‘I thought for sure its tail was going to flip over my boat, you can hear me say “yikes” at that point, but she just rubbed it instead.
Marcy can be seen looking over the humpback whale’s tail as she paddles a mile off off Kihei in Hawaii
She was joined by the whales for a total of two hours as they swam around her and the mother humpback is pictured doing a tail slap right in front of her
‘I go out on my kayak several times a week, more during whale season.
‘My kayak is 10 feet and the baby was much bigger, I would say 15 feet. The mum is hard to tell but adult humpback whales are from 35 to 45 plus feet!
‘They stayed near me for about two hours. It was amazing. I just sat there and the baby would keep making approaches.
The retired nurse said she has been kayaking for 27 years and had some amazing experiences but this one was really special
‘At one point she even started doing tail slaps right in front of me!
‘I have kayaked off Maui for 27 years and have had some pretty amazing experiences in my kayak with whales, but this one was really special!
‘This baby was just so friendly and playful.
‘It is illegal for people to approach whales any closer than 300 feet and I always adhere to that. The whales, however, don’t always follow these rules.’