Whale Scares Boating Partyoff Wellington

Grey River Argus, 22 May 1947, Page 2

Whale Scares Boating Partyoff Wellington

WELLINGTON, May 20. “The boat seemed to shrink. I felt I was sitting on a matchstick.” This was- how Mr F. R. Lewis described his feelings when a whale surfaced alongside his fishing boat 50 yards east of the tip of Moa Point, Wellington on Sunday afternoon. Mr and Mrs Lewis and Mr K. Turner had left Terakino Bay for a day’s fishing. Another boat was anchored about 50 yards away.. The whale was first seen some 30 yards off, and, disliking such commany, Mr Lewis put out the oars and prepared to row for the shore. The first stroke of the oar scraped the flank of the whale, which had suddenly surfaced alongside the boat. The occupants prepared to abandon ship, and the crew of the other boat cut. their anchor and stood by to render assistance. “It sounds funny now,” said Mr Lewis. “But it wasn’t at the time. We thought we were all going to be thrown over. We started to row, but the whale kept circling us. Sometimes she was only 20 yards from the shore.” Mr J. Byford, who was in the other boat, said the whale did not remain on the surface, and nobody could tell where it would next, appear. The only warning was a sudden glassing of the water just before it broke surface. The whale’s hump was badly scarred and speckled with barnacles, its length would be about 50 feet. “But it's hard to estimate in times bke that,” said Mr Lewis. The whale was quite friendly, but seemed to want to rub its back on Lb/bottom of the boat.