The Caledonian Star is sailing just off of the Abrolhos Archipelago, at latitude 18 degrees south in Brazil, in search of marine creatures. So far we have seen great numbers of boobies (a type of gannet) and many humpback whales. The whales spend their days here in shallow water birthing their young and mating. Within the next 6 weeks the whales will migrate to their feeding area in the great Southern Ocean near the Antarctic continent and the Caledonian Star could likely see these same whales down there in January and February! In the morning we observed two adult females with a very young calf. Then in the afternoon, a different mother and calf were lounging in the warm tropical water when the calf began doing a series of breaches (photo). We stayed with them for over a half an hour before leaving them. It is exciting to have naturalists Tom Ritchie and Lyall Watson, authors of the book Whales of the World, here with us. Their knowledge of these animals is shared with everyone on board as we observe one of the most exciting animals on our planet.