During the summer I actually wrote a couple of blog posts whilst working for ORCA on board of King Seaways as an Ocean Conservationist, I just never got round to posting these. Better late than never, without further ado here is one of these blog post I wrote.
It is time for my second rotation on king seaways. This time I was very eager to get on board and see if I could find my rhythm again. It was great to embark whilst knowing that this first crossing of my rotation would be with my colleague Nina, who would disembark on the next day in Newcastle. Unfortunately we only saw one quick surfacing of a dolphin, it happened so quickly and just to the side of the ship, that we weren’t able to identify. It then took a couple more days before I finally saw something again; a porpoise on the Dutch side of the North Sea. Two days later I saw a bottlenose dolphin bow riding the King whilst leaving the piers of North Shields, soon followed by another harbour porpoise swimming away from the ship.
Then came the morning of the 28th of April where I started my observation just after 7am with a couple of passengers and quite soon we were treated with one bottlenose dolphin on the left of the ship and two white beaked dolphins to the right. Followed by two separate harbour porpoise sightings and another singular bottlenose dolphin. However it really kicked off when we passed Sunderland. There were harbour porpoises absolutely everywhere. Some swam alone, others were in small groups of 3 and 5. Some groups included mother calf pairs. During this morning I was joined by at least 50 passengers who were all able to see the harbour porpoises very clearly, as some were really close to the ship. And these passengers really helped me to count all these harbour porpoises. In the end we saw 34 harbour porpoises. That evening I had the feeling that I should be outside on the observation deck the moment the ship left the harbour. So I decided to listen to my gut feeling, and was rewarded with one harbour porpoise and the first minke whale of the season!
There was one other great crossing full of sightings during this rotation. This was my last crossing on my own, it was another harbour porpoise party on both the Dutch and the UK side. In the evening leaving IJmuiden I had many passengers with me who were really keen and some actually really good at spotting harbour porpoises. As I was starting to notice that this rotation really caught up with me and my energy levels, but seeing the enthusiasm of these passengers really kept me going until sunset. That evening we saw 13 harbour porpoises. The morning I started around 7am and almost immediately the porpoises sightings started again, upon arrival I had seen 15 harbour porpoises.
The crossings leaving from IJmuiden during this shift were very busy, as the May vacation had started in the Netherlands, where many school kids are free for two weeks, and many families take this time to go on a short vacation. This for me meant that I was speaking Dutch more often than English. And basically giving presentations in two languages at once. As I kept them in English but the Dutch asked their questions in Dutch. It was great fun to keep translating the questions and the answers into both languages.
Look into the life of an OC on King Seaways
The deck watches do give the best interactions with the passengers, as that is the moment where the conversations are more in depth whilst observing the sea surface for some dorsal fins or splashes that could indicate the presence of a dolphin. Most of the conversations are about the species we might see in the North Sea and where we might see them, some conversations steer more to the sea birds as they are always present and visible for everyone. Sometimes I do get some more personal questions about life on the ship and what I do when the ship is in the harbour. So let me give you a small look into the average life of an Ocean Conservationist on board King Seaways:
The mornings are relatively early, at the moment the alarm goes around 6 am. I guess closer to the summer this might become earlier still. At 6 I get up and ready, first a quick breakfast, one cannot do a deck watch without a proper breakfast. After breakfast it is time to start the deck watch, start the survey lookout over the sea and hopefully see some cetacean action. Currently the mornings arriving in the UK prove to be more successful regarding sightings, than the mornings arriving in the Netherlands. With sightings of bottlenose dolphins, white-beaked dolphins and harbour porpoises. We do these morning deck watches until the ship arrives in the harbour. When the ship arrives, I normally go to the wildlife lounge to do some administrative work, and check the photos I took (if I took any). When finished with this, it is our time off work. There are various things we can do whilst off. Sometimes I go to the crew gym, to get my energy flowing again and get warm, as the North Sea isn´t the warmest place in the morning. Further, we have lunch on the ship, we could read books, watch a movie/series. Get some additional sleep or a nap, as our evenings can get quite late. Once a week we have a safety drill in the morning.
Sometimes though, if we feel like it or the weather is good, we actually leave the ship with the passengers and go outside, explore the towns where we are. For me I mostly tend to explore the coast around North Shields. Whatever we do, stay on the ship or go outside, we have to be back on the ship before the passengers start boarding again, or at least before 3 pm. From 3:30pm we start with our meet and greet, this is when the passengers start boarding and where we welcome the passengers on board and already give some information about what we do on the ship and where they can find us during the crossing. This is followed with a quick dinner in the crew mess at 4:30pm. From 5pm we open the wildlife lounge, where all passengers are welcome to learn more about all the amazing wildlife of the North Sea that might be seen from King Seaways. This is also where we will give a presentation, have some children's activities. From around 7pm we start the evening deck watch, these are however, weather dependent. If the weather is really good, for instance with a calm sea, we could start our deck watch earlier. If the weather is slightly worse or just not good at all, we could do deck watch later or maybe even not at all. It all depends if we think that we might see any cetaceans. And you can tell by the passengers as well, when the weather is good more passengers can be found outside on the deck, whereas when it is bad weather less passengers go outside to the decks. And as we do want to reach as many passengers as possible, we should join them.
I must say I do love it when passengers are really enthusiastic looking out for whales, dolphins and porpoises from the observation deck. Especially when they do see some dorsal fins and start shouting and pointing. That energy always puts a smile on my face!
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