A KAYAKER has captured the moment a humpback whale was spotted off the coast of Cornwall.

Rupert Kirkwood, from Bude, saw the creature lunge-feeding in the waters off Penzance on Thursday.

He has spent the last 15 years kayaking around the coast, but says he has never seen anything quite like it before.

During this year’s Seawatch National Whale and Dolphin Watch, Rupert was keen to match, or improve upon, his last year’s total of 96 (80 common dolphins and 16 porpoises).

On the first day he paddled 22 miles round Veryan and Gerrans bay to the east of the Roseland Peninsular. Normally he would have been thrilled with the forty porpoises he saw, with a lot more heard puffing but not seen, but he practically leapt out of his kayak seat as a whale surfaced and breathed behind him, but he never actually saw it, and was a little deflated.

He was absolutely focused on trying to see a whale on day two and after checking the wind forecast he headed to Penzance.

Rupert said: “I was on the water just after sunrise and the sea was like a pond. No wind, no chop, no swell. Absolutely perfect. Any fin or disturbance at the surface for up to half-a-mile away I was going to see. Although the best guide were the gannets. They only have to circle round once to make me paddle over to check for porpoises, or even better, dolphins.

“First up were a couple of porpoises, a mother and a calf. Always great to see as they go about their business in an unobtrusive manner, and a speciality to see from a kayak because their loud puff can be heard from quite a distance as you slide along in complete silence. Any sort of engine noise would drown them out.

“Fantastic — there were slightly bigger fins ahead. A little pod of common dolphins, including a couple of youngsters. Then a couple more small groups of about half-a-dozen. My Seawatch survey was gathering pace.

“I kept two to three miles offshore after Mousehole as I was hoping for the big stuff, and sea conditions were exceptionally relaxing. Just after Lamorna the sea was suddenly boiling with life. The surface was stippled with shoals of little fish which covered areas the size of tennis courts, all over the place. I found myself in the middle of several compact shoals and I could see through the crystal clear water that they looked like sand eels.

“Just listening was extraordinary. There was the puff of porpoises everywhere, the ‘thoomph’ of diving gannets, and the splash of shearwaters. Then an almighty, powerful slashing, splash right in front of me that can only have been a giant tuna, although I never saw the fish. It must have been way bigger than a common dolphin.

“I was drifting past Tater Du lighthouse, two miles offshore. I knew that it was a very big spring tide today and the current was up to two miles per hour dragging down towards Land’s End. I already had an eight mile paddle back to Penzance, and with my cruising speed of three miles per hour, it could be a long paddle back. Especially after yesterday’s twenty plus miles.

“Then I heard what sounded like an extended breath, but far, far away. Could have been a prolonged tuna splash, but I hoped it was a whale’s breath. I sat and had a cup of coffee and a think about what to do, and listened. There it was again. Then nothing more. I turned to head back to Penzance but just couldn’t drag myself away. I was just about to start paddling when I heard the breathy noise again, and then another in a different place. So can’t have been a whale —unless there were two!

“Half-a-mile ahead a great grey bulk emerged from the water and disappeared in a huge splash. What? Must have been a lunge-feeding minke whale — wow. I powered on and I saw a whale’s blow! So no minke because they don’t show a blow, so even more amazing. I stopped and waited and the whale came a bit closer. This is my first decent sight and it is heading directly towards me. It was a humpback!

“Then the real excitement started. It lunged at a patch of sand eels close by and I started the video. As I waited for it to surface a dark patch of sand eels came steadily closer, which was a bit (in retrospect, very) worrying. I could clearly see two large patches of sand eels at the surface, and I was sitting right in the middle of one of them. I knew the whale was about to engulf one of the shoals so when the sand eels started to leap out of the water all around me I peered down into the water to see if the whale was on the way up! Unfortunately the whale chose the other shoal.

“How can this be happening just off the coast of Cornwall? I would have pinched myself if there had been a gap in the action. Next up it lunged directly towards me. Unbelievably a minke whale then appeared on the scene, right beside Shearwater II. My closest and best ever view of a minke, and what I was really hoping to see today, but it was a sideshow compared to the humpback.

“At one stage they both surfaced together in the same eyeball-bite. Next a pod of about ten common dolphins appeared on the scene and shadowed the whale in search of an easy bite. The whale played up to the crowd.

“I saw four species of cetacean within half an hour (humpback, minke, common dolphin, porpoise). Last year it was only three species. And a giant bluefin tuna leapt clean out of the water right in front of me as I was just starting to paddle back. Today’s total was one humpback, one minke, 36 common dolphins, 25 porpoise bringing my week’s total and contribution to national whale and dolphin watch to 105 individual cetaceans.”