BAY HEAD — One Brick Township resident has one whale of a tale after paddleboarding in the ocean off Bay Head.
Frank Restivo often paddleboards in the summer months, off both Ocean and Monmouth counties. Armed with his GoPro, Restivo has taken some incredible footage of whales and dolphins feeding, playing and just swimming in the ocean.
However, one morning last week, Restivo had a much closer — and exciting — encounter.
A video on his YouTube channel, called “Sup and Sea Life,” shows a large whale breaching the surface, feeding on a school of fish a few feet from his paddleboard.
This encounter was a chance one, as Restivo always tries to wake up early to get out into the ocean. However, this morning, he woke up late and was running an hour or so behind.
“I like to get out there for the sunrise because that is when it is most beautiful and that is when I’ve seen the most marine life activity,” said Restivo.
“As I got down by the ocean, I put the GoPro on my head and I looked out there and I saw the whale jumping. My first reaction was I was aggravated. I said to myself, ‘If I would have gotten up, I would have been out there and (seen) it.’ But I didn’t give up, and I decided to chase him,” said Restivo.
He then began to follow the whale’s wake, chasing the massive animal north into the waters of Bay Head. Restivo said he was paddleboarding like he was “in an Olympic race.”
“I felt like I was gaining ground, but I wasn’t. He would go down, then come up farther out. But fortunately I didn’t give up, for some reason in my mind I just kept chasing him.”
Having desperately tried to keep pace with the whale, Restivo eventually noticed that the animal was heading toward shore. Now Restivo had a goal of trying to cut the whale off. As he began to paddle he eventually figured out why the whale was heading in that direction.
The closer he got to shore, Restivo saw pods of dolphins circling a massive school of bunker fish.
“I’ve seen this from the beach with a friend of mine a couple of years ago. It’s common that dolphins and whales will feed together,” said Restivo. “The dolphins will circle these big pods of bunker bait, making them tighter and the whales are opportunistic and get in there and take a whole bunch right in.”
He explained that because of the way the dolphins were circling the bait, the whale was just hanging around. Eventually, as he positioned himself just off to the side of the school, the whale breached the surface, gobbling up a few hundred fish at a time.
“He jumped right in front of me. That (video) was not zoomed in. I didn’t doctor it. It was right in front of me. You can hear it. As he jumps and creates a wake, you can hear my paddleboard slap the wake of the waves,” said Restivo.
On top of being an avid paddleboarder, Restivo is a certified scuba diver, fisher and snorkeler. He works as a union ironworker and “loves to stay as active as possible.” This includes heading to the gym, biking, fishing and muay thai.
The full video, along with many other marine life videos, can be found at his YouTube channel “Sup and Sea Life” at youtube.com/@SupandSeaLife07.
This is an excerpt of the print article. For more on this story, read The Ocean Star —on newsstands Friday or online in our e-Edition.
Check out our other Bay Head stories, updated daily. And remember to pick up a copy of The Ocean Star —on newsstands Friday or online in our e-Edition .
Subscribe today! If you're not already an annual subscriber to The Ocean Star , get your subscription today! For just $38 per year, you will receive local mail delivery weekly, with pages and pages of local news and online access to our e-edition on Starnewsgroup.com.
Local News
Comments / 0