The Best Time To Swim With Humpback Whales
The best time to swim with humpback whales in Tonga is any time during whale season — otherwise, the whales are simply just not there!
Expect 1-3 amazing days on a 5 swim day tour, and 4-5 amazing days on an 8 swim day tour. If this has been your dream, we highly encourage you to do an 8 swim day trip. You are coming all this way, and nature needs time to try and deliver.
Watch our 5 Day Swim video below, to get a sense of what a 5 swim day trip could look like.
The whales come from Antarctica toward the end of June; we start swimming with them in Mid-July all the way through to the first week of November.
We have never had a group not swim with whales in 10 years!
July/August: New babies, mating behavior, heat runs
September/ October: Mostly mom & calf encounters.
We find October to be an amazing month, full of mom and calf interactions. In October we find the moms are tired and the calves are more curious. If you struggle to swim or have kids, October tends to offer longer swims without as much effort.
Instead of thinking about “best time” in terms of what month to come, it is really best to think about your water time. The more days you put in on the water, the higher your chances of having memorable, meaningful encounters.
We tend to see and swim with the whales almost every day, but we aim for real, quality encounters, not just fleeting glimpses of the whales. Our guides and boat captains know when and where to put you in the water to make sure this happens.
A quality encounter to us, is one of close proximity that last at least 10 minutes. It is nature, and sometimes groups get more quality swims that that. Every whale and every encounter is completely different, at the end of the day, it is really up to the whales.
There is really no “best” time to come during the season. Although some say otherwise, you’ve got a high probability of swimming with whales any time from July through to early November, no matter when you come. And since all the females don’t give birth at the same time, we can see new calves throughout the season we’ve even seen brand-new babies at the end of October. We have never had a group not swim with whales.
Please watch the video below, to see what a 5 swim day trip could look like.
Expect 1-3 amazing days on a 5 swim day tour, and 4-5 amazing days on an 8 swim day tour. If this has been your dream, we highly encourage you to do an 8 swim day trip. You are coming all this way, and nature needs time to try and deliver.