Dana Harbor Promises Whale of a Sight : Festival Offers Boat Trips, Exhibits During Annual Migration

The passage of the gray whales along the Orange County coast, a migration now under way, will be celebrated at Dana Point Harbor during four weekends beginning Feb.15.

More than two dozen special events, along with hourly ocean cruises to watch the leviathans roll and spout a few hundred yards offshore, will be packed into the eight days of the 14th annual Festival of the Whales.

“You can go anywhere along the coast and have experts tell you how big a gray whale is, or how much milk its calves drink, or why they migrate from the northern oceans to the southern lagoons,” said Harry Helling, festival coordinator and educational director of the Orange County Marine Institute.

“But this is going to be a truly educational experience. We’ll show how a marine mammal’s skeleton is prepared for exhibition, and how it feels to plunge your hand into Arctic water just above freezing temperature and grab a piece of blubber, and how bows and special arrows are used to tag whales so their movements can be studied.”

Symphony Afloat

The festival theme of “Music and the Whales” will be highlighted by a concert by the 60-member Capistrano Valley Symphony Orchestra aboard the brig Pilgrim II, anchored just off the Marine Institute dock at the west end of the harbor.

“While such works as ‘And God Created Great Whales’ are being played, we hope to be able to project color motion pictures of swimming whales upon the Pilgrim’s sails,” Helling said.

At the same time, a special amplifier will be lowered into the ocean from a boat “to take music to the whales,” he said.

The free concert, scheduled for sundown (about 6:30 p.m.) on March 2 in the west end of the harbor near the Marine Institute building, will conclude with Tchaikovsky’s “1812” Overture accompanied by volleys from the Pilgrim’s cannons.

Other attractions will include a full-sized inflated model of a gray whale, scuba-diving instructions in the heated pool of the Marina Inn and the preparation of a dolphin skeleton with boiling vats and carnivorous beetles.

Hourly Cruises

The hourly whale-watch cruises will be conducted from the Dana Wharf Sportfishing docks during all days of the festival, with a charge of $7.50 for adults and $5 for children.

Most of the festival activities will take place at the Marine Institute or the nearby Youth and Group Facility buildings, although several restaurants will present frequent showings of whale-related films and lectures.

Nearby Doheny State Beach will be the scene of daily guided tours through marshes and live exhibits of tide pool creatures. On March 3, the public is invited to join in making a sand sculpture of a full-sized (45 feet) whale on the beach.

On the opening day Feb. 15, Navy patrol boats will be available for inspection at the Harbor Patrol docks near the east end of Dana Point Harbor.

On the final Sunday, March 9, Hayden Williams, professor of marine science at Golden West College, will give an illustrated lecture at the Marine Institute titled “How Whales Sing.”