Monday, May 12

Well what a bloody amazing trip today was. Sorry readers but I have to say bloody as that really is the only way that this Aussie can describe how great a trip it was this afternoon.
We headed out of the harbor to calm, almost glass-like Salish Sea waters with a report of creatures that aren’t usually seen in these waters. Upon approaching the south-western side of San Juan Island and viewing some rather hook-like, bicoloured grey/white dorsal fins, we were able to confirm these creatures as Pacific White-sided Dolphins. Although these creatures are found throughout the North Pacific it is somewhat rare to get these creatures so far south of the island as they are typically found in the northern waters around Vancouver Island. Perhaps they were on vacation? I’d never seen these creatures before in the wild and Captain Brad had never seen them in these waters, and he’s been working on whale watching boats for 4 years! What an absolute treat! We observed 4 individuals travelling together, and being the gregarious, playful bow riding dolphins that they are, passengers were extremely lucky to witness these animals bow-ride on a couple of other boats, giving us some great photo opportunities. The “lags”, as they are commonly called around this region (shortened from their Genus name Lagenorhynchus), went from boat to boat riding the bow wave and then the wake created from the vessel motors. Then, it was Orca Spirit’s turn! The lags came right up and swum around the bow of our boat, and because the water was so calm and clear we could easily see their white underside with prominent light grey patch on their foreside and a narrow light grey ‘suspender’-like stripe across the top half of the body below the dorsal fin. They then began to ride the wake of our boat and passengers were absolutely delighted to see these two metre long graceful delphinids swim just under the swells created by our boat and porpoise out occasionally, giving us some great Kodak moments. Check out the photos below. You will notice the distinctive grey/white hooked dorsal fin in the first photo, and the other two are of these lags riding in the wake of the Orca Spirit.

After observing these white-sided dolphins play in our wake we thought it best to let another vessel experience the beauty and grace of these animals, so we slowed down and the lags veered off into calmer waters. As the waters were so calm we went and checked out an area known as Hein Bank, which is a shallower body of water between Dungeness Bay, Washington State USA and southern San Juan Island, as there are often baleen whales feeding in this region, but unfortunately not today. So we headed back to Victoria, seeing plenty of harbor porpoises, and then stopping off at the Chain Islands and seeing plenty of pregnant harbor seals hauled out on the rocks, and also a bald eagle perched up on a cormorant’s nest. It truly was a fantastic afternoon to be out on the water, with passengers and crew alike being extremely lucky to be able to view Pacific White-sided Dolphins frolic in the wake of boats. Who knows if we will ever see them this far south again anytime soon. Let’s sure hope so! Days like today though cannot help but make you feel so lucky to be able to view such a diversity of marine mammals in their natural habitat, and all within a short distance from the harbor!