Boundary and Rosario Orcas

Biggs Orca All Around

The first animals to see today were some black oystercatchers, bald eagles, and harbor seals. A particularly cute harbor seal pup seemed to pose for me. We then saw Boundary and Rosario Orcas. We motored up into Boundary Pass to start with seeing the T65As, T36As and a couple of more individual whales.

Boundary Pass

Our viewing time continued with them almost to the rich people’s protection zone. As we neared the boundary, we needed to break off to see other marine life. After backtracking to Java Rocks, we saw more bald eagles, black oystercatchers, and harbor seals.

I tried to see if there had been a humpback whale spotted nearby but no luck today. We did, however, head over to Rosario Strait and spent a little time with the T36Bs and T99s.

Rosario Strait

The first group was sleeping and not very active, but the ones behind were playful and even breaching some.

In one of the pictures, there is a tug boat and small petroleum barge. I misidentified the tug as the former Willamette Chief. I was thinking it to be the current Island Chief, until looking at my pics on the computer. Years ago I started as a deckhand in Portland harbor on the Willamette Chief in 1979.

The tug in the photo is also one I sailed as a captain on the west coast and Alaska. It was the ‘Jennifer L’ when I worked it on the west coast. It later became the ‘Richard M’ and then the CE Campbell and now just CE. In about 1989 I was running it on a dredging job in Monterey Bay’s Moss Landing. A few days after the Exon Valdez oil spill. As a result, I was towing two barges to Prince William Sound and spent the next five months working on the cleanup efforts for that oil spill.

That concluded the day, and we cruised back to Friday Harbor making for a beautiful day with Boundary and Rosario Orcas.