Wednesday, June 24th

We had a wonderful trip aboard the Orca Spirit this morning. We travelled to Hein Bank, a hot spot for minke whales and an area where we commonly encounter orcas as well. We saw a harbour seal and several sea birds but were not able to find whales there this morning. We continued our tour by travelling up the coast of San Juan Island. We crossed the strait back towards Victoria. We had a great wildlife encounter in the Chain Islets where we saw several harbour seals, a fascinating little marine mammal and important food source for transient orcas. At Great Chain Island, we witnessed one of those national geographic moments as we watched a majestic bald eagle being pursued by gulls while carrying one gull in its talons! One last foray towards Constance Bank, with several porpoise sightings along the way, concluded this fine tour.

Our afternoon trip took us deep south into the Strait of Juan de Fuca in search of a humpback whale that had been sighted southwest of Race Rocks. The waters were calm with just enough swell to make it interesting as we travelled across the strait. Despite an intense search by two whale watching vessels, we were unable to locate the whale that disappeared in the mass expanse of the Salish Sea. We did see several porpoise feeding in the calm waters. We continued our search as we headed back towards Victoria stopping at Race Rocks. As the tide was flooding, most of the harbour seals that are usually present were most likely out foraging. We still saw several though, and a young elephant seal hauled out on the rocks. The highlight of this afternoon's tour was our visit to the Parry Bay eagle's nest where we have watched two young eaglets over the last few weeks. Today, we saw the two eaglets in the nest being watched by a parent perched above the huge nest.