Today when we left Roche Harbor it was raining and foggy. We exited Roche by way of Mosquito Pass and entered into Haro Strait. We headed south down San Juan Island and the sun then decided to come out right as we came across some whales! We came upon J2 (Granny) who was headed North up towards Boundary Pass. It is pretty common to see Granny leading the group during travel period. Granny is the matriarch of J pod, which means she is the oldest female in the group and is considered to be the most dominant individual. Only a few minutes after we saw Granny we then sighted the adult male L87 (Onyx), who is commonly seen traveling with Granny since his mother (L32) died in 2005. After Onyx passed by we then got a look at the J16's which includes Slick and her three offspring J26 (Mike), J36 (Alki), and J42 (Echo). The rest of Jpod caught up to our boat after a few minutes, which included at least 12 whales surfacing at the same time! It was very cool to see all of the whales in such close contact. For the first few minutes the whales were just traveling North very slowly but after a bit the surface behaviors began and they weren't going to stop anytime soon! We saw quite a bit of breaching, tail slapping, pectoral slapping, spy hopping, and some good belly flops! We left the whales at the West entrance of Spiden Channel and went to Spiden Island to look at some seals hauled out on the rocks and swimming by the shore. We also saw some Bald Eagles in flight over Spiden Island as well. Our trip looked like it was going to be a bit wet today but it ended up being a beautiful day out on the water! We had a wonderful trip today and a wonderful group of guests to share the experience with!
Naturalist Rachel
San Juan Outfitters M/V Sea Hawk