Whale Watching but NO Whale!!

As previously mentioned, we went Whale Watching at Dana Point, Anaheim on Tuesday (21 December 2010. The weather was still bad... gloomy and it was drizzling abit (at least it wasn't pouring like the day before... where we were all soaked to the bones in Disneyland) and I wasn't sure if the tour out to the Pacific Ocean was still gonna happen. Was gonna call them, but figured that even if they were going to give us a rain-check, we still had to be there to exchange the vouchers. So drove all the way down from our hotel in Cerritos to Dana Point. It took us about an hour. When we arrived, the tour operators mentioned that the sea is calm and if the wind does not pick up, the tour will go on. The only thing was that the tour is at noon instead of 10 am. So we thought we should go and have a nice breakfast. Our GPS software showed that the St.Regis was a couple of miles away from where we were. And that was where we headed out.

Waaaaa... The entrance to the St. Regis is soooooooooooooooo nice. My very spoilt boys who initially said that they were too full to eat again suddenly decided that they want to eat after all.... BUT BUT... St. Regis has NO self-park and the only way is valet-parking. And knowing me... I really really do not fancy paying like $30 for parking! So off we went from the really fancy and luxurious St. Regis. Out pop the GPS software again, and Voila! Marriot is again round the corner... and certainly Marriot is cheaper than St. Regis... we go there.
ALAMAK! Again. Valet Parking only. H was like... "really don't want to go ah? Why so cheapo?" ...I really wanted to grit my teeth and ngeh-ngeh-lai say OKAY but really cannot make myself fork out $30 for valet parking lah. So where you think we ended up??
Denny's!
Free Parking PLUS think the bill was less than $30!
And boys ate so much that they were gonna burst!
By the time we finished, there wasn't really much time left so we headed out to the Dana Point Harbor again.

There were about two other families that joined us.. all in all, think there were only 11 of us.
Here are some photos... You can see that the sky is sooooooo gloomy and grey. A very depressing day.

This is what was offerred...

Boats around...

View as we pulled out from the harbour

Pelicans (? or albatross? I also donno) in a row

Fly free as a bird....

I tell you... the birds (albatross? pelicans?) were HUGE and one kept landing on the boat we were on. My silly S2 actually screamed out sooooo loud the first time this HUGE bird landed rather close to him. I thought what had happened.

Although it is the GRAY WHALE MIGRATION Season, we didn't even get to see one. There were hopes of seeing a baby sperm whale - which was trapped somewhat out there whereby boats had to go out and rescue it the day before... but NADDA on the day we went out. There was one time when H saw something move ... and not long later, our boat was also heading towards it. I was like soooo excited but then... bleah. it turn out to be some debris washed out by the storm. I don't know if it's because of the once-in-a-decade storm that had made the whales go a bit 'confused' in their journey.

Anyway, as they GUARANTEE that you see a whale, they gave us "WHALE CHECKS" which has no expiry date. Apparently, the company has been around for 40 years and they say they will be around in the next 40 years. So I guess I can keep those "WHALE CHECKS' coupons and bring my GRANDCHILDREN!!

The boys? Think half the time, they were sleeping inside the boat!

Before I go...here is a picture of the Xmas Tree at Disneyland taken the night before.....