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A few people who were catching some rays and waves Sunday afternoon on the Balboa portion of Newport Beach ended up catching a rare sight: A whale was swimming incredibly close to the shoreline.
The whale--possibly a gray whale--was spotted surfacing to blow and seemingly rubbing itself on the sand about five feet from where the water's reach lapped the sand, according to the OC Register's Beach Blog. It's just about the time for gray whales to make their way down from Alaska to the warm waters of Baja--with perhaps a stopover in the OC.
Video captured Sunday's whale spotting in Newport.
