Jordan | August 27, 2018 | M/V Sea Hawk | 2:00 trip
Photo Credit: John Rosford
Today was a great day out on the water! The sun finally shone brightly in the sky after many days of cloudy and smoky haze. We left out of Roche Harbor as Captain Gabe and I took to the sea to find our whales. We headed south out of Mosquito Pass and down the south side of San Juan Island through the Haro Strait.
As we were searching for wildlife, we suddenly saw a blow off in the distance! We found a whale! We rushed over and found a huge humpback whale heading north up San Juan Island through the Haro Strait. The giant animal got super close to our boat! We even saw his huge nostrils! As the whale dove into a deep dive, his tail popped up and flashed our boat with its beautiful patterns.
Luckily one of our guests captured a fantastic up-close picture of the fin so I was able to compare it to our photo identification catalogue and id our whale! His name is Monarch! Each humpback tail fin is super unique with all different notches and white spots and scratches that differ from whale to whale. With this uniqueness, we are able to identify specific individuals in our Salish Sea.
Then we travelled north up towards Turn Point, the most northwestern point in the continental united states marked by a beautiful beaming lighthouse. We soaked up the breathtaking sights as we circled Stuart Island before heading back down through John’s Pass, passing by tepees along the shoreline.
We eventually made it back home happy with a humpback day!