We enjoy swimming, and before my shoulder got cranky I used to love the Butterfly stroke. It’s a way of “porpoising” through the water with a “dolphin” kick and it feels wonderful. In my youth cetacea (whales & dolphins) inspired a clumsy poem with their ease in mixing air and water. No surprise then that we watch for them when flying over water, and today we saw this pod feeding. They blew bubbles under water, feasted on the fish they’d corralled, then came up for air as they raced to rejoin the pod.
1389 Breath Sequence 1
Top-left is the first aerial I’ve snapped of a dolphin exhaling as it surfaced for a breath.
1390 Breath Sequence 2
It was back beneath the water so quickly I missed the actual blow before it inhaled and dove, but some of the blows we saw were probably 15 feet high.
1392 Breath Sequence 3
I did manage to catch this middle one just after it blew and was nosing down. You can just make out the mist of the blow above it in the pic. I like this last shot Anne got after they’d reformed the pod, and but for some motion blur I’d have posted it to our Photo Page.
3203 Dolphin Pod
The ripples of light on their backs has an ethereal beauty for me. Imagining a serene family closeness as they chat about the meal and what to do next. Similar yet so different from our family experiences. Completely untethered by things, always on the move, and able to “see” right through each other with sonar. Immersed in a translucent universe of air and water.
John & Anne Wiley 
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