Meeting Patch and Mystique

We met our friends for brekky at Barnacles, the cafe where the dolphins turn up each morning, but we arrived after the feeding, just as all the tourists were leaving.  I found these books and discovered that the author, Norma, was sitting at the next table and she offered to sign the books (and, she also has a granddaughter Emma). 

As we were now the last customers in the cafe, and ready to leave, a bloke called out that three more dolphins had just arrived...

The procedure is very strict with Dept Environment and Heritage allowing only one feed per dolphin per day, so they had to check whether these three had already been fed.  They hadn’t arrived with the usual pod for the morning feed, so the cafe called one of the team back to feed them some fish as we waited with the trio.  The two older dolphins, Patch and Mystique, just sat on their big tails in the sandy shallows, leaning on their fins, patiently waiting, while the young one, Ozzie, swam about.  

It’s the same Mystique in the books who was thought to be female, but later found to be male.  He had some serious wounds on his side, apparently from a shark attack, but they were healing well, according to the ranger.