Harbor Seals

The beautiful sun sparkled on the water all day for us on our 5 hour circumnavigation of Henry Island today. The harbor seals were too many to count throughout Mosquito Pass and all along the west side of Henry Island. Some of the male harbor seals even delighted us with their mating dance, jumping out of the water and slapping their flippers on the surface. We had tons of fun talking about seaweed in the kelp forests, making bull kelp horns and even snacking on the...

Our 5-hour paddle today was full of iconic Pacific Northwest wildlife sightings!  We counted several Bald Eagles, some soaring and some perched in tree tops, others dive bombing for big fish. Harbor seals swam playfully around our boats as we paddled along the West side of Henry Island. With the wind at our backs and a flooding current carrying us forth, we felt quite rewarded during the second half of our paddle after working hard against some southwest wind coming...

Starting off with low tide of -1.2 vertical ft, our morning tour had amazing access to a colorful display of red, green and brown seaweeds, purple Ochre sea stars and bright orange anemones. We also got to see lots of fuzzy harbor seals hauled out on high rocks in the kelp forest, and a juvenile bald eagle greeted us from a snag on our way back into Roche Harbor. Later, we saw two adult bald eagles holding high posts on the west side of Henry Island, accompanied by more...

M/V Sea Hawk got to experience some curious resident orcas this afternoon. Captain Chris and myself took our guests over to the west side of San Juan Island to encounter J-pod. When we approached the orcas they were porpoising quickly and high out of the water. A lot of the time when we see them doing this, they are picking up speed while traveling.

We watched Granny's group travel past us and then slow down. They started to socialize with one another and it looked as...

Another beautiful June day on San Juan Island. After pouring rain early morning, the storm blew off and temperatures got near 70 degrees again!

Our whale watch boat, the Seahawk, went out on the water today and encountered both J-Pod and L-Pod near the Lime Kiln Lighthouse! J-pod was showing some impressive feeding behavior with spy-hops and breaches all around. One whale even soared through the air with a salmon in its mouth!

Guides Nick and Brenden just got off the...

Yesterday's whale watch trip started out unspectacularly- as we were leaving the dock the sky was overcast, with bits of drizzle here and there and we hadn't heard any news about whales in the area all morning. As a whale watch guest who has paid good money this uncertainty can be disheartening, but I assured all 8 of our passengers that sometimes while we are out we hear reports of whales from other boats and that sometimes we ourselves are the first ones to stumble...

Today I paddled out of Roche Harbor on a 3 hour tour and we spotted orca (killer) whales! Thanks to our whale watch boat I received the whale report before leaving the harbor, but was not sure if we would be able to see the whales as they were already headed north in the Haro Strait. We paddled out to the kelp forest off Henry Island and as we were eating some seaweed, looking for seals and listening for eagles we saw some killer whales! There were quite a few...

All three of my kayak trips had excellent harbor seal shows! The water was glassy enabling us to see every little seal head. This time of the year harbor seal pups are starting to leave their mothers and are more adventurous than ever! We had one particular pup who was very interested in our kayaks and continually popped up next to and behind us. It is also harbor seal mating season and we watched many seals launch their bodies out of the water and lob their...

Today was a pretty fantastic day all around-- gorgeous weather, active wildlife and calm water. As we rested in the bull kelp forest, we kept a sharp lookout for harbor seals, and were rewarded when a mother decided to haul herself out of the water and on top of the kelp just a few dozen feet from our boats. There she proceeded to get comfortable and nurse her pup!

Earlier that day we'd been resting in the same spot when an eagle flew down from its nest on...

With the sun out and blue sky all around, all three morning kayak trips enjoyed an abundance of wildlife. They spotted bald eagles, harbor seals and river otters. The morning was low tide, which allowed us to observe sea stars, kelp crabs and moon jellies. The day ended with four of our guests from the 5 hour kayak trip taking advantage of the great weather by going for an impromptu swim.