M/V SeaHawk | Monday, July 22nd, 2019 | 2PM Trip | Naturalist Alexandria
What a great day we had out on the water! We all boarded onto M/V SeaHawk as we left Roche Harbor. We worked our way in between Pearl Island and San Juan Islands as we left the harbor and headed north into San Juan Channel.
When we left the dock we didn’t have any firm reports to work off of. This is by no means rare. These orcas can swim over one hundred miles per day, and travel at speeds faster than most boats. We decided to head over to Flat Top Island while we waited to see if any reports would pop up. Captain Sarah planned on heading up to Boundary Pass since that was one area most boats hadn’t covered yet, and thus we were hoping might be where some orcas were.
While there is never any guarantee that we will find orcas when we head to these uncharted areas, it is always a good strategy. We work with boats all over the Salish Sea to communicate when sighting occur, so when there are no firm sightings within our range, each boat chooses a different area to scan.
While hanging out at Flat Top we were able to see some absolutely adorable harbor seals! They were all hauled out of the water or splashing in the shallow areas in front of us. It was absolutely adorable!
As we were heading north as we had decided to do, Captain Sarah received a report on the radio of a family of Biggs Killer Whales pretty far off. This meant that we would have to extend our trip past the 4 hour mark. We are always happy to do this if they are close enough to make it possible to see them, but we also want to honor our time commitments for all of our guests.
After checking in with all our passengers on board, each of whom graciously said they would rather stay out longer in chances of getting to see orcas even if it meant them having to reschedule their plans, we decided we had to go for it!
It was sure worth the trek! We got to see a wonderful family of orcas, splashing around, presumably having just eaten a nice snack! While it was a long haul it was certainly worth it!
Until Next Time,
Naturalist Alexandria