Sunday, May 24th

Our afternoon tour was another brilliant adventure spent with J-pod, our most commonly encountered orca pod. However, passengers were in for an unexpected treat as we encountered a gray whale just outside the harbour. What a great start to the tour! After viewing the magnificen mysticete (whale geek speak for baleen whale), we travelled east to San Juan Island. There we had a fantastic encounter with Mike (J26), Slick (J16) and Echo (J42) and other members of the J16 matriline.

Our 4pm tour caught up with J-pod west of picturesque Speiden Island. There we encountered about half of J-pod moving slowly northbound. First we watched a large group of orcas that included Blackberry (J27) and one of the new calves (J44) pass astern of us. We had a great pass from another group of whales that were frisky to say the least. We saw spyhops, tail slaps and other spectacular behaviours. All in all, it was another amazing day on the water.