Being on the craft every day that we get to be on it, it’s truly like moving meditation, this whole journey.

Greetings from Australia and welcome to another episode of Animal World: Our Co-Inhabitants! Today’s show takes us to the nation’s East Coast where we will meet some of the benevolent members of the TransparentSea project.

TransparentSea was a concept between our group of friends, where we wanted to do everything that we enjoy all in one. And so that’s be out in the ocean, be focusing on the issues that are critical at this point of time, pollutants in the ocean, whales in jeopardy from whaling fleets, and pollution and sonar testing, you name it.

To highlight these issues and others concerning the health of the marine environment, the friends undertook a 700 kilometer voyage aboard sailing kayaks down Australia’s East Coast, from Byron Bay to Bondi Beach, a journey that began October 1, 2009 and lasted 36 days. This specific stretch of coastline was chosen as it is the same route the endangered humpback whales take when they make their annual migration between Australia’s northern coastal waters and the Antarctic Ocean. A 44- minute film entitled “TransparentSea” that documented the trip was released in March 2010.

And we wanted to use our positions as photographers, as surfers, writers, and people who have the good fortune to be able to blow a whistle on these issues. And so we just came up with the idea of being able to do all that in one, and join the whales in their migration, and from there it had a lot of energy where it just started attracting the right people.

We started collaborating with the Surfrider Foundation, and Tangaroa Blue (Ocean Care Society) and the Sea Shepherd (Conservation Society) of course, and our own group “Surfers for Cetaceans,” and then the surfing industry came on board.

The TransparentSea crew was headed by former World Junior surfing champion and vegan David Rastovich, who co-founded “Surfers for Cetaceans” an Australian non-profit organization seeking to protect dolphins, whales, and other marine life.

I am a surfer and I am blessed to have a position within the surfing industry where I can be a communicator and can help expose certain issues in the ocean. So that’s what I am doing. It’s pretty abstract; all I can do is surf well. There’s nothing much else I can really do great. But it doesn’t much matter; that just proves that if you’ve got the passion you can use whatever your skill is for the benefit of others.

Other crew members included Chris Del Moro, co-director of Surfers for Cetaceans and a California, USA artist and surfer; Will Conner, an Australian musician, Hilton Dawe, a world-class Australian water photographer who specializes in professional surfing, and general manager of Surfrider Foundation Australia, a non-profit organization dedicated to protecting Australia’s oceans, waves and beaches, Kristy Theissling.

At the end of the day we are doing what we feel most motivated to do, and making use of the skills we have at our fingertips, and giving a portion of what we do in our lives to something greater than ourselves. So Hilts (Hilton Dawe) is using his photography, he’s an amazing photographer, and so he gives that.

Here is Kristy Theissling to tell us about the partnership between the Surfrider Foundation Australia and the TransparentSea project.

Surfrider Foundation Australia and Tangaroa Blue (Ocean Care Society) have a national marine debris initiative, and our role in the TransparentSea project is to manage and collate the data that we collect from our rubbish clean ups.

So basically the kayaks sailing to wherever they are sleeping that night, collect the rubbish, after we have done the collection we spread out the rubbish and count every single piece. That is then computed into our national marine debris database, and we use that data to support local initiatives and generally approach local councils, or as part of our national campaigns or individual campaigns, about various things, depending where the debris comes from.

What we are doing is providing information, being a conduit, so that our surfing world knows what’s going on, because when we started the trip, saying that we wanted to do beach cleaning ups, and everyone was scoffing at the idea, saying our beaches are clean.

But then when we went on the journey and we were sweeping beaches, picking up hundreds of pieces of plastics and rubbish that shouldn’t be there, on our so-called pristine beaches, we all did a double take and went, “Oh, actually, we do need to clean our own act up here in our back yard,” and that there is a shift and a great tangible turnaround in perspective.

The concept was also a formula that we wanted to test, because we want to do this all over the world. There’s surfing communities along coastlines of so many parts of the world where there are issues that need exposing, and issues that surfers could be helping stop. And so we really see this is the great way to be grassroots and to tap into those surf communities and motivate each other, and work together, and be inclusive. So, with our trips, we really want to be cleaning up the beach, and hanging with the locals.

We’ll soon return with more about David Rastovich’s TransparentSea project. Please stay tuned to Supreme Master Television.

A chance of a lifetime; When do you get to go 40 days on the ocean in a little, tiny craft and explore the coasts of Australia? It’s pretty amazing.

Welcome back to Animal World: Our Co-Inhabitants here on Supreme Master Television, as we learn more about the amazing journey of the members of the TransparentSea project, who followed the annual southern migration of humpback whales along the East Coast of Australia.

The goal of this 700 kilometer sea voyage by sailing kayak from Byron Bay to Bondi Beach was to draw public attention to the huge danger the migrating whales face from whaling ships and the pollution of the oceans by humankind. It was also to highlight the need to safeguard other marine life such as dolphins and the importance of keeping beaches clean. The voyage was done by traveling on sleek vessels that are both ultra-quiet and eco-friendly. Apart from the four main sailing kayaks that made the journey, an additional sailing kayak was made available for guests to accompany the crew for short segments of the trip.

There’s this little craft, Hobie sailing kayaks and they are 16 feet long and about 10 feet wide. They’re a trimaran basically, which is three hulls and they have pedal power and they have a sail and you can steer them really easy. Strap your surfboard on the side, put all your food on the back and inside the craft.

Let’s now get a taste of what the journey was like from the perspective of crew members Chris Del Moro and David Rastovich.

Dave, Kristy and I were going, we were kind of in good rhythm together, tacking and we saw a little baby, a juvenile slapping his tail, and we stopped, pulled the sails so we don’t bother him and out of nowhere the mom comes from the depths and just Woomm…. Slow motion, full breach …o ohm! And I’m talking 50 yards from us.

Wow!

And it solidified why we were doing this. It’s incredible, I mean, what a day!

And then we spotted an offshore seamount that was really shallow and really amazing and then there was heaps of wildlife around it and then had a dolphin encounter that was just epic.

Here they come, Wahoo!

Wahoohoo! Hallo beautiful!

Probably about 10 or so came over to my boat and start bow riding like they do on powered vessels. And I was just losing it because we hadn’t had any interactions with dolphins yet, so we were all starting to wonder if they were, wary of the crafts and things, if they were a bit scared of them. But these guys were coming under the boat, like literally two feet away and then under the nose of the boat, right under the front and I was pedaling as fast as I could, had all my sail out, just to try and keep them interested because we’re pretty boring really. We can’t communicate with them.

So that lasted for, I don’t know how long, but quite a few minutes where they were just surfing all around and then jumped between me and Morat and just all the time; really cool interaction, way out to the sea too, in the deep blue, so it was really nice. And then they just did two big jumps and then left. Gone.

Many whale species are endangered, particularly the humpback. At one point in recent history they were hunted nearly to extinction. We have much to learn from these highly intelligent beings as David now points out using one important example.

Yes, it’s interesting the words we use in our culture as humans in all areas of human language, we’re very small (in vocabulary) in comparison to the whale’s vocabulary and how much they communicate. Their range of sound goes so far and so below what we have in our range of creating sound, and then their intricacy and their memory to create patterns of songs and communication is so much more intricate than ours, that it makes you think, “Well everything in nature has a purpose.”

There’s no excess baggage here, you have what you need in nature right? So, they need to talk about something. They need to be communicating for some reason on such an intricate level and so, I think for us as humans to be in the vicinity of a creature that has such a need to communicate, is an incredible experience.

We thank all the organizations and individuals involved in the TransparentSea project, including David Rastovich, the Surfers for Cetaceans and the Surfrider Foundation Australia for their committed work in bringing awareness to the current dangers faced by the humpback whales and the entire marine environment from harmful human activities such as whaling and the dumping of pollutants.

Through initiatives like these may we all soon awaken and forever seek to safeguard and preserve the aquatic environments and their inhabitants.

For more details on the TransparentSea project, please visit:

Please join us again tomorrow on Animal World: Our Co-Inhabitants for the second and final part of our program profiling the TransparentSea project. Friendly viewers, we’ve enjoyed your company today on our show. Up next is Enlightening Entertainment, after Noteworthy News. May the soulful melodies of the ocean always fill our spirits with the love.

Does what we choose to eat affect our overall health?

Even at the age of 90, if I change my type of diet for a few years, my intestines can change. So if it’s very narrow, and you eat a lot of brown rice or five-grain bread, anything that is not refined foods, then the colon can become much softer.

The chronic diseases like heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes, obesity, these are all diseases critically linked to what we put in our bodies, what we eat.

Hear from top physicians why a vegan diet is the key to vitality, strength, and long life, Monday, July 12 on Healthy Living.