Look what washed up on the shores of Kashima.
This is about a ten minute walk from our house.
I don't know if you can get a good sense of the size from these pictures, but it was about 12 meters long. Astute viewers will notice the last picture is at a completely different angle, this is because we actually witnessed a large wave flip the whale over while the water around it turned red with blood. Also, I got close enough to touch it. It felt like thick rubber.
For the English speaking viewers:
If you listen closely in the video, you can hear Tomo say, "cool" and Ray, say, "scary." I'm trying to comfort Ray by telling him, "It's ok."