Humpbacks in Haro Strait
As we left the harbor, I was scanning for orca while heading towards a pair of Humpback Whales. We got some nice views of the humpbacks in Haro Strait. A bit later we learned of a pod of Orca spotted from a ferry passenger. Spirit of Orca and three other boats headed for the sighting location and began searching. We did not find the Orca pod. However, later in the day, I ended up with a pod of Orca north of Nanaimo.
On the way to the Humpbacks, we stopped off at Spieden Island to view a couple of Bald Eagles. One was in a tree but sitting in the shade, and I couldn’t get the lighting right. Then the other took flight, and I was able to grab a nice shot of it. The two Humpbacks were Divot and Stitch. I recognized Divot and assumed it was Fader as they had been hanging out together. However the other was Stitch.
Canada Geese
At some point, I saw some Canada Geese in flight and shot a couple of frames. Beautiful birds in flight.
Fruitless Search for a ferry Sighting
The search for the pod of whales near Active Pass had one boat in the pass scanning over into Georgia Strait. Spirit of Orca scanned the west side of the channel, and another boat scanned the east side. No Joy. I went over the top of Prevost Island and searched on the way south. I later learned had I taken a right turn instead of a left turn we would have seen a lone male Orca T77A.
We were running out of time, so I started back for the harbor getting there a bit late for my next tour. We tried but did not succeed in finding the orca spotted from the ferry.
Killer Whales Way up North
My second tour we headed for East Point and searching the Strait on the east side of Active Pass, still looking for the missing orca. No luck there either. My tour guests were game for a long haul, and since I did not have an evening tour, we could make this one longer on the way to a pod of Orca that was off of Vancouver and headed south. However, on the way north, the whales flipped and were now heading northwest. I felt I was already committed though and kept going. It was two hours before we arrived on scene with the whales.
When we were ten miles out, I heard that T77A is on the inside of Saltspring Island and it had to be the “pod” that we were looking for on the morning tour. It was a single male that is known for some long down times. He eluded all four boats searching for him earlier in the day.
Near Howe Sound
Now we saw some fantastic views of Orca with brand new views of Howe Sound, with Mt. Garibaldi in the background. I also had Texada Island in the background of some of the pics. In the five years, I have been doing tours here I have not seen Texada Island. I have seen it hundreds of times in my career as a tug captain sailing inside passage to Alaska, but this was a first for my whale tours.
We were north of Nanaimo as you can see in the screenshot I captured showing us fourteen miles north of the 49th parallel. On our two-hour journey home, we stopped off, and I shared one of the Canadian Bald Eagles with my guests. 😉 This eagle was sitting in a tree near its nest. It was a sweet evening seeing Orca north of Nanaimo and worth the trip. I only wish we could have located the other for my morning guests.
Check out some of my other photoblog pages at Whale Tales.
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