Been out with the One With Whales team in Dominica a few times now. Honestly the thing that i loved me most was the sound, not what I expected to be the highlight at all.
Before anyone gets in the water they use hydrophones to find the whales. You can hear the clicks clearly, constant echolocation. But then sometimes you get these patterned sequences, codas, which are basically how the different clans communicate with each other. Dominica has a resident population that's part of a larger southern Caribbean community of around 400 individually documented whales. Some of these pods have been studied for decades.
One more thing that i found very intersting was how little you actually see. These animals dive for over an hour at a time. What happens at the surface is basically just the breathing break.
They keep it to six guests max and only three in the water at once. The Armour family who run the local side have been working these waters for generations and honestly the whales behave differently around boats they recognize.
If anyone wants the specifics on how the in-water protocol works or the permit situation in Dominica this page has helped me: https://www.onewithwhales.com/swim-with-sperm-whales-in-dominica
Anyone else spent time around sperm whales? I'd love to know what the sound experience was like for others.