Whale Watching Report

Captain Carl reports beautiful conditions, whales, and wildlife from Explorer 3. Stay tuned for updates from our Naturalist.

What an amazing day on the water! We started off with harbor porpoise in Guemes Channel and Rosario Strait. At the south end of Colville Island we found a couple of harbor seals hauled out on the rocks. We made our way west in search of whales and when we found them, it was quite the surprise. Captain Carl found us a lone male orca offshore, only he wasn't quite alone.. there were three minke whales swimming side by side. We have seen them swimming with orcas before, but the combination of all three minkes swimming together trailed by an orca, was crazy! The orca was L79 Gaia. It seemed like the minkes and Gaia were just playing around, blowing bubbles and swimming in close quarters. It was very entertaining and fascinating to watch. One of the minke whales even breached for us! It was amazing! A breaching minke whale! He only did it once, but it was great! We left the craziness of Gaia and the three minkes. Soon we found another L-pod male, Nyssa, L84. Nyssa gave us some great looks as he passed by the boat. We moved a little further inshore and spent a little bit of time with a couple of K-pod whales, K40, Raggedy, and K21 Cappuccino. We had to head back to the dock, but not before we caught up with the minkes and Gaia again. This time Gaia was headed back inshore, followed by two of the three minkes. It was comical! We found one more minke off in the distance. We did another slow down at the south end of Lopez Island. There were two bald eagles perched majestically on Swirl Rocks. It was truly a beautiful day with sunshine and two types of whales!