Our guests are guided through a once-in-a-lifetime adventure, full of fun, unique sensations and surprises. We offer boat excursions for small groups in the Pelagos Sanctuary, to come in close contact with whales and dolphins.
Our clients will be able to personally take part in the exciting search and observation of marine mammals and other creatures that inhabit the Ligurian Sea. Experts will illustrate the main features of each species encountered, and there will be excellent occasions to shoot truly memorable images and footage. Above all, they will grow to know and appreciate the beauty and mystery of our seas.
We also offer tours of Gallinara Island, a gem of Western Liguria, and fishing tourism excursions to promote sustainable fishing.
COSTA BALENAE is a worker cooperative established in 2013 by a group of biologists, eager to start a new adventure: share their knowledge, passion and love for cetaceans to satisfy the growing need for people to reconnect with nature.
Our president
Barbara Nani, who founded the first Italian whale watching company back in 1996, founded Costa Balenae by bringing together the other five founding partners:
Marco Ballardini,
Silvia Trucco,
Patrizia Patti,
Giuseppe Zolesi,
Davide Ascheri,
Elena Fontanesi and
Federica Gelsomino.
We chose to group up as a worker cooperative because we firmly believe that democracy, fairness, equality, openness and solidarity should also be enacted in the workplace, so we strive to put people before profit, and work before capital. Costa Balenae is a member of Confcooperative, an Italian association of almost 20.000 worker cooperatives.
Our long-term project is to build an environmentally sustainable boat, using natural materials and eco-compatible techniques, with an eco-friendly, silent motor, so that the sightings may be less stressful for the animals. A boat built especially for whale watching, big enough to enable us to offer quality tours, tailored to our clients and their needs, but still respectful of the marine environment and its inhabitants. As our tours are intended for small groups, the boat will hold a maximum of 60 people; this will enable us to tend to our guests more closely, and to better convey scientific information and facts about the tour.