Diário de Maturidade: swimming with whales in Tonga

Once I decided to go to Tonga I knew that I would do my best to do this tour. Of course it would depend on how much, as I didn't want to spend too much, but it was something that I really wanted to do. I searched a bit before on where would be the best place, if in Tongatapu, Eua, Ha'apai or Vava'u to swim and also a few companies that do this tour.

The whales are usually around Tonga from June to October every year as they come from Antarctica to give birth to their calves in the warm and tranquil waters of Tonga. So if anyone would ask me the best time to go to Tonga I would say during the whale season, but Tonga is amazing no matter what, with whales or without whales, so go whenever you have a chance.

Anyways, while we were there we walked a bit around Tongatapu to check the prices and availability. It was a bit busy because of the high season, so in the beginning we didn't get any spots available for the week we were there and apparently Eua and Tongatapu were the best places in that moment as the whales were not more around Ha'apai and Vava'u anymore. We found the company, Deep Blue Diving. I've searched them before while I was in New Zealand and they seemed to be very reliable and good. It was a family business and they were very nice. They mentioned that they were very busy but they would put us with a small group that would do free diving and swim with the whales, so we would follow them. The price was T$330 with lunch, but we bargain and ended up paying T$300. They were also the cheapest company I found as most of them charge minimum T$400.

There we went on the following day. we put our clothes, they explained how the tour would go and that they could not guarantee that we would see whales, but most likely we would and we did. There were 2 instructors and they divided the group in 2. We were 8 people and each group 4 with one instructor each time we would go to the water. So we started looking for the whales, I don't know how they can find them so easily. We found the first one and the first group went to the water, I was outside trying to take photos of them when they would come out of the water for a short second. Everything is really fast. First group went, they saw and swam with them and now it was our time. We found them again very easy and to the water we went.. I swam a lot, I was trying to get close to them and also taking photos and once I see these beauties underwater, they were just WOW, really wow, massive, with their babies, not so babies as they were really huge already. I drank so much water, as I was kind of 'lost'. Well, came back to the boat and did this for maybe 5 more times. Jumped to the water whenever we found one and swam with them. In one of the moments I think there were like over 7 whales swimming with us, I didn't even know where to look. And at some point one whale started releasing some bubbles and I couldn't see it anymore so I just started swimming to the other direction, but just because it felt like I was very close, but sometimes I wasn't as since they are so big it looks like we are extremely close, but we are not. At least myself, but there was one Korean guy that was really really close and he was a flawless swimmer. The Humpback are so beautiful, perfect swimmers and quite fast when they want. So sometimes, whenever we started swimming towards them they would disappear in a second and other times they were there just playing with us. It was once in a life time experience that I will never forget. I think I saw/swam with more than 20 whales and I wasn't really expecting that.

By the end of the day I was so happy after seeing these beauties. It was totally worth it doing this tour and I would do it all over again. I hope to come back to Tonga one day and swim with them again but next time maybe in Vava'u as I heard that it's one of the best places to see them. Tonga was definitely one of the best countries I've visited for many reasons and swimming with the humpbacks was one of the them.

Deep Blue Diving Tonga: https://deepbluediving.to/

They also receive volunteers from all over the world to help them during the whale season. There was even one biologist from Brazil