Department Of Odd Occurences–Whale Of A Ride: Tired of stories about surfers and sharks? Probably not, you bloodthirsty scum. But today you’ll have to look elsewhere to slake your lust for guts and gore. Because this surfer story is about a guy at Laguna Beach who thought he was riding a wave, and looked down to find he was in fact riding a whale. Yup, a whale. “All of a sudden I just felt, wow, this huge noise and bump,” said [Spyros] Vamvas, “and it lifted my board up. I’m looking down, and there’s just swirling water and I see barnacles on the back of the whale. I’m used to dolphins. This was different. It was huge.” I’d be tempted to say that Vamvas was tripping his brains out, except that he’s 60 years old (and there were plenty of witnesses). More impressive, the whale–estimated at between 15 and 30 feet– gave him a pretty smooth ride, dropping him back into the water before heading back out to sea. What was the whale up to? I’m guessing it was a whale frat prank, or a version of Whale Fear Factor…



“Damn. I just gave that old surfer Dude a ride, and now this stupid scuba diver wants one too…?”