The beauty and majesty of North Atlantic whales. NOT.
If you ask my children how our trip to Bar Harbor, Maine was, the first thing they will start yapping about is how “Mom barfed”. Sadly, they are not lying.
The day started innocently enough: buffet breakfast at our hotel, some wandering around downtown Bar Harbor, a great lunch at Geddy’s. As we were leaving lunch, the Whale Watch pier was right across the street. “If we hurry we can make the 1pm whale watch” I stupidly said. Cranky Daddy ran down to where passengers board the enormous boat and asked if we could still get on. “Sure thing” said the friendly people there. We rushed upstairs to buy tickets while they held the boat for us. I informed the folks there that we weren’t Kennedys, and that this was so nice, and they were all “it’s no big deal”. Indeed. So we hustled onto the boat and the man at the ramp told us that there are 3 to 5 foot swells out there, to which I answered, “Well it’s no fun if there aren’t 5 foot swells!” How prophetic. We got some seats in the cabin of the second deck, and the boat started hauling out to where the whales supposedly feed. It was a very rough ride. The plan was to ride out about an hour, since the feeding grounds were about thirty miles outside the harbor. About 20 minutes in, people in the cabin started moaning and groaning and clinging to their “Sic-Sac” bags. (I looked it up and “Sic Sac” is still a widely available brand of leak-proof sickness bags that look like they were made in 1952). I wasn’t loving being indoors, so I stumbled my way outside for some air. Cranky Daddy and Cranky Son #1 wandered around, and Cranky Son #2 wasn’t going to leave his seat at any time. I went downstairs to buy some chocolate to make our tummies feel better, and the boys ate all of it. Now the temperature in the cabin had gone up about twenty degrees. I had my choice of freezing cold and wet outdoors or very nauseous hot and miserable indoors. At this time, people in the cabin were vomiting everywhere, and the heat plus the smell was horrific. Cranky Son #2 wasn’t budging, so I was spending only a minute at a time inside the cabin.
Finally we arrived at the mythical whale feeding grounds. The fog was very thick, and there was no way in hell we were going to see any whales. The naturalists use all their tricks (except sonar???) to spot some whales, but they couldn’t find any. I now understand that whales are expert at not being seen. Next course of action: relocate by traveling really fast again in choppy seas. Yay! I remained outside fighting the sea spray which was better than the alternative spray indoors. Stop numbers two and three did not yield any better results for watching whales, so the crew determined that it was time to go, after viewing zero whales for almost two hours on choppy seas. Don’t worry, though – they guarantee whale sightings or you get a voucher for another trip - for free! I’m almost 42 years old an I’ve never been seasick, but as we started the relatively smooth ride home, every bit of my digestive tract registered its displeasure. I asked the Cranky Daddy to get me a bag. What? “GET. ME. A. BAG.” In retrospect it was about as calm as the “Bring me a bucket” line from Monty Python fame. I puked my brains out with my sons on either side of me. During the wretched affair, one son rubbed my back and said “let it all out – you’ll feel much better” while the other son held my hand and let me know that I would “probably want to brush those teeth, or maybe rinse your mouth out”. It’s really funny to hear your own words come back at you in such a circumstance – I’ll never say those things again. They were very annoying and unhelpful. The four of us enjoyed the rest of the ride back to the harbor on the outside deck, where a man erupted in a spray of vomit two chairs down from us. He almost got it over the side. I like to think I just took care of business discreetly and moved on, as opposed to the poor folks who were moaning and retching and making lots of noise like BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAH - HOOOOWAHHAHH and ROWWWWWFFFFF. Seriously dramatic.
It took two full days for the world to stop moving when I shut my eyes. Good times. I’m sure this event will make the “What is did this summer” essays that are perennially required during the first week of school. If we’re lucky, Cranky son #2 won’t illustrate it.
