The humpback whales visiting Australian waters generally spend summer (and late spring and early autumn) feeding in the Antarctic.
But as the cold weather approaches, not only does food become scarce in the Antarctic but the waters become too cold for these warm-blooded animals. In fact, the cold could kill their young calves were it not for the layers of blubber insulation.
Also, it is the warmer northern waters that are their breeding ground.
Whale watch cruises
From the start of their annual journey north, the humpback whales reach the southern Great Barrier Reef around the middle of June. By early November, most would have left the Queensland coast on their way back to the Antarctic.
During this same period southern right whales appear close to the southern coast of Australia, although they also do travel farther north.
A large proportion of the humpback whales in the Great Barrier Reef stop over for a few days in Queensland's Hervey Bay on their way south to the Antarctic. Hervey Bay whale watch cruises bring people and whales relatively closer together. (There are rules which stipulate distances that must be kept between them.)
Old whaling town
While the whales avoid land masses, they do keep relatively close to shore, particularly on their way south, that many eastern Australian vantage points are suitable for whale watching.
Cape Byron, south of the Queensland border and Australia's easternmost point, is one of the more popular whale watching sites in New South Wales, as is Eden on the Sapphire Coast close to the Victorian border.
Eden, an old whaling town, holds its Whale Festival in October and whale watch cruises are most numerous in October and November.
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