Back in the 1970s, I was once sailing back from Catalina Island on my little 22 foot long sailboat after spending a week there. When I was about 5 miles off the California Coast, a Orca jumped out of the water as high as the top of my mast (or a little higher) and crashed into the water rocking my boat. I sent my girlfriend down below and I lay in the bottom of the cockpit holding the tiller and trying steer. The Orca repeated this three times. It was unnerving.
Did you ever look into whether the orcas' behavior might have been an attempt to knock you off the boat? Your story reminds me of this video of seal-hunting orcas making waves to knock seals into the ice. [1] I assume you weren't dressed as seals :)
I had a Columbia 22, a very light weight boat. The Orca could have destroyed the boat or come over the side of the cockpit. I think it was just messing with me.
At the apex of it’s jumps out of the water it was looking down at me with dark eyes. I really thought it was a nasty creature.
I was in a 22' Excelsior near a gray whale when it decided to breech. Big whale + little boat == feeling of awe + healthy sense of how big the boat is not.
Can whales even see much out of the water? I assumed they had the same blurry vision out of the water that humans have in the water due to the difference refractive index of water and air.
Not all humans have blurry vision underwater [1]. It seems, from the article, that children from that tribe can learn constrict their pupils and accommodate their lenses so as to see much better underwater.
But the quote that followed it is probably much more relevant to this discussion..."Seals and dolphins have a similar adaptation." Since orcas are actually the largest of the dolphin family and not whales, it might apply to them as well.
orcas have very good eyesight, including out of the water. they often use a technique called spyhopping where they intentionally poke out of the water to see along the surface of the water for navigation, to see prey further away, or just to inspect their surroundings.
"Then the fish came alive, with his death in him, and rose high out of the water showing all his great length and width and all his power and his beauty. He seemed to hang in the air above the old man in the skiff. Then he fell into the water with a crash that sent spray over the old man and over all of the skiff."
Good times. Not.