Saturday, October 25th
It was another beautiful autumn day, as Captain John, naturalists Sean and Corey, and our intrepid group of guests headed out into the
Saturday, October 18th
Wednesday, October 15th
This morning Captain Brad and naturalist Kaylin ventured out on a clear, calm sea topped with hundreds of birds to the horizon. The water being a little quieter than usual, we search for a while, but none the less came across some transient killer whales. They were stalking two stellar sea lions. The black fins swarmed around their little brown heads, we thought for sure they were goners. But the prey must have put up a good fight because soon we had one exhausted sea lion swirling around our boat, close enough to touch our port then starboard to port to starboard. Coming to the surface, he gave us a look of desperation with a big breath. After the coast was clear, the sea lion swam away and we observed the tripod of orca's: T44, T41, and T41A. Their desired prey got away and we watched them sail out to find another catch.
Tuesday, October 14th
Today was another amazing fall whale sighting. We had a sunny morning as we happen to drive straight out to the humpbacks. Wasting no time, we arrived with two peculiar individuals deep feeding and lacking their fluke raises. However, they were brilliant to watch as always. We soon were encouraged to find the orca's. As we scoped out west, we had a pod to our right and soon one to our left. We found ourselves amongst the party of five transients, the T2's. This group of mothers and calves lowly rolled alongside us. The young ones were porpoising and doing cartwheels for a very good watch.
This afternoon we ventured down south to two transient orca pods traveling and socializing together. The mammal eater's, T20's, of mother and son were tail slapping and spy hopping amongst the group of females, T2's, we had visited this morning. They were barely moving, zigzagging and showing themselves off in the afternoon sun. Heading towards Victoria after a cruise through the pinniped query around Race Rocks, we thought we would try to find some humpback whales. Even though there was no sightings yet in the afternoon, it only took a few minutes looking and we were with the two whales we had our morning coffee with. It has been a week full of marine biodiversity that does not disappoint!
Monday, October 13th
A Thanksgiving Treat!
This afternoon we were out to what seemed to be a quiet Strait. But it definitely became alive when we encountered a 'superpod' of resident killer whales. We were lucky enough the rain subsided and then to be completely surrounded by these salmon-loving orca's. We had a large group simultaneously surfacing with the large male residents Faith (L-57) and Ruffles (J-1). They displayed playful, feeding, and resting behaviors; this is the incredible thing about viewing these animals surviving in their natural habitat.
Sunday, October 12
Today we went out for a trip to remember. We were lucky to have lots of sun on the flat sea heading just south of Victoria. It was not long before Captain Brad spotted Orcas straight ahead. Fortunate enough, he spotted Humpback blows not too distant in the other direction. We drove out to meet the Orcas first. A group of five transients, all female and calves. As we arrived, they displayed repeated tail lobbing and very playful behavior. Unusual for these 'discrete' predators, along with socializing, they were also vocalizing. We had repeated surprise breaches very close; had we been closer, we would have been soaked. Soon we had another full group of mother and calve transients meeting this group. After the visual greeting, we decided those Humpback whale must not be too far away. We met up with three giants moving extremely slowly with beautiful tail slaps and graceful dives. An amazing October day.
Saturday, October 11th
Both the weather and the whales were absolutely magnificent today on this fine October Saturday. With flat calm seas, the Orca Spirit ventured out into Juan de Fuca Strait in search of orcas, humpbacks and other marine mammals. It did not take long for Captain Brad to spot a group of three humpback whales east of Race Rocks. It would turn out to be just an amazing experience as both passengers and crew were in awe of these amazing cetaceans. Naturalist Corey, captain Brad and our group of intrepid guests were thrilled by some fantastic behaviour from the three humpback whales including pectoral fin slaps, fluking and even a few very rare humpback spyhops! While watching the three humpback whales, we spotted a fourth humpback whale a short distance away. We left the the whales to travel to Race Rocks where we watched the antics of several Steller and
The afternoon trip would prove to be equally spectacular. We started our tour by visiting the group of three humpback whales that had so enthralled us this morning. Once again, the whales did not disappoint. The huge whales thrilled us with some amazing passes as the three humpback whales continued to swim and dive in unison. It would prove to be one of the most memorable humpback experiences of my four year naturalist career as the whales surprised us after surfacing from a deep dive and showed up right off our stern. One could not ask for a better pass! We continued our journey, once again showing our guests the majestic Race Rocks in all its pinniped splendor. On the way back we stopped in
Monday, October 6th
October Humpbacks!
We had a gorgeous fall morning with no rain and not much wind. Traveling only a few miles out of the harbour, we spotted one Humpback whale in the distance and soon were right alongside three other Humpbacks. They repeatedly surprised us as they surfaced at our Stern, then tail fluked on a deep dive, then again a big blow at our Port, then a deep dive and again at our bow. Once there were three and then there were four! As the group tagged on another member the whale performed a cartwheel and some raised pectoral fins. Only a short distance away we saw the sea creatures in close detail and got a really good listen as they made elephant-trunk-like blow noises with their 20 foot high exhalations. As we ventured on to Race Rocks, we approached and had hundreds of gulls flying over our heads, and to soon realize a bald eagle had taken over the fishing rock. We also had sea lions splashing and 'porpoising' around playfully, stopping and staring back as we stared at them.
Saturday, October 4th
This morning, the Orca Spirit, Captain Brad, naturalist Corey (me) and our intrepid group of passengers headed south into Juan De Fuca Strait in search of whales and other wildlife. For me, nothing beats late summer/early autumn whale watching and this trip was just another example of why. Shortly after leaving the harbour, we spotted two humpback whales. These leviathons of the deep amazed us with some spectacular behaviour, and gave us some awesome views of their tail flukes. The markings on the tail flukes of humpback whales are unique to each individual whale and we can use them to monitor which whales are returning to the area each year.
While watching the whales, our Captain kept his eye out for orcas. Looking through his binoculars, while we were watching the humpbacks, Brad managed to spot a distant dorsal fin. We left the humpbacks to investigate and soon found ourselves surrounded by orcas! Were these residents or transients? These are the questions we also ask when we arrive on scene. It was only a short time into our encounter that a surprise surfacing from a large male left us no doubt as to their identity. Mega (L41) surfaced next to us! It was the L12's, a group of resident orcas from L-pod. We watched these animals move east, than do an about face and travel west. It was near the end of the trip, that we had absolutely one of those awe-inspiring moments. As we were watching the orcas, the humpback whales were only a short distance away. One of them began slapping its huge tail flukes. The humpback whales travelled towards us and at one point, we observed the large pectoral fins of a humpback whale and the spectacular dorsal fin of a large male killer whale. We were enjoying the company of the two most amazing cetaceans at the same time! What a spectacular trip. It was an excellent way to end a wonderful trip!
Wednesday, October 1st
This morning we were one of the first boats out on the water. And it was beautiful on the water; quiet, calm, and sunny. We went north to the San Juan Islands, to find Resident Orcas breaching as we approached the scene. We initially had two calves playfully splashing around our boat, followed by a surrounding of Orcas darting for salmon. We watched and listened as they busily chatted away on the hydrophone with high pitch squeaks and whistles. And if that was not to amaze, only a mile or two off, splashes from a humpback whales breaching! We could see their enormous blows from far and soon we were with a mother and her calf. The crew was shocked as it is not very often we see these whales in the Haro Strait. Leaving the scene, we got a big wave from their enormous pectoral fin.
Tuesday, September 30th
This afternoon we went southwest of Victoria's Harbour. Watching the shoreline closely for the mammal-eating orcas, we had an adult bald eagle soar low, right over our boat. We were then observing the 40 to 50 turkey vultures flying over the cliff bank, to look down at a dozen harbour seals hauled out on the rock. Approaching Secretary Point we met our destination of transient killer whales. The pod traveling right on the shoreline in search of a good seal lunch. We had a close, long watch as they slowly snuck around the banks.
Monday, September 29th
Sunday, September 28th
