San Juan Island Adventures

San Juan Island sea kayak wildlife update for Tuesday, June 1:

Yesterday afternoon Debbie and I paddled out for a 3 hour sea kayak tour with a private group. We were thrilled with the wildlife we saw-- lots of harbor seals sunning themselves and bald eagles doing exploratory flights. Debbie even found us some purple ochre sea stars to check out!

The highlight of the trip was catching a glimpse of wild bald eagle behavior that neither she nor I had ever seen before-- or...

Our Sunday afternoon trip (May 31 2010) caught up with a group of Transient Killer Whales that had been traveling from the straits into San Juan Channel. Apparently they had been hunting in the Cattle Pass area between whale rocks and goose island for more than an hour before moving northeast into San Juan Channel/Griffin Bay area. The Sea Hawk caught up with them just outside of Friday Harbor as the whales made their way slowly northeast.

It is not uncommon to...

Captain Brian G. and I went out for a private charter this morning, and what a gorgeous morning it was! Some spectacular highlights were watching a peregrine falcon in flight (3 different times!) off Turn Point, watching a school of harbor porpoise race towards an oncoming boat and bow ride (not typical behavior), and getting some amazing views of a large herd of male mouflon sheep. They were off by themselves, and we saw some good examples of aggression between...

I'm afraid I haven't been blogging as frequently as usual, and for that I blame Facebook and Twitter. We at San Juan Outfitters are on both (follow us athttp://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Friday-Harbor-WA/San-Juan-Outfitters/60... & http://twitter.com/sjioutfitters) and I've really been enjoying writing quick updates about our tours, staff, events, and of course, wildlife spotted.

I'll continue to blog, post and tweet(!) updates regularly, so keep reading!

The blustery weather cleared long enough for Captain Brian and I to set out on a whale watch tour. We were hoping for a sighting of transient orcas (killer whales), but no luck. We were lucky with a few harbor porpoise sightings, many many harbor seals, a number of bald eagles displaying interesting behavior and a wonderful up close look at a peregrine falcon sitting just a few feet away!

We also drove very close to Spieden Island where we were able to see large...

Well Noelle and I just returned from our first multi day sea kayak tour of 2010! We had a great, cheerful group and were both happy to get out on the water and dust some cobwebs off our paddling skills. We left Friday Harbor, paddled north and on Day 3 arrived at Roche Harbor-- all without retracing our steps.

Despite varying inclement weather our cheerful group made the best of each day. We were able to paddle around the Wasp Islands, hike around Jones Island...

Today I paddled out on a 3 hour kayak tour. It was a bit windy out but the overcast clouds created the most beautiful colors-- all of the islands to the west were clothed in wonderful shades of blue.
We saw harbor seals, courting bald eagles and lots of shorebirds.

As we were paddling down the west side of Henry Island we spied a Steller sea lion surfacing a few times just a few hundred feet away! This big guy was hard to identify at first because he surfaced...

Today I was able to paddle out with a lovely family new to the Northwest. Luckily for us we had gorgeous weather and could see clear to the Olympic, Cascade and Vancouver Island mountain ranges. The wildlife was visible as well, with a number of harbor seal sightings, various shorebirds seen and heard and even three harbor porpoise. I thoroughly enjoyed showing off a bit of the splendor of the islands, and the Pacific Northwest!

For me the highlight was spotting...

Whale Watching Tour San Juan Island

Just a quick blog regarding our trip Saturday March 20th. Our first official wildlife charter of the year. No sign of Southern Resident Killer Whales today. Lots of Dalls Porpoise, Harbor Porpoise, and Stellar Sea Lions on Speiden Island (12). It looks like the Peregrine Falcon pair are nesting at Turn Point again, in the narrow drainage below the rock outcropping known at "Lovers Leap" to locals. One of the adults was...

It's springtime here on the island-- which means the weather is likely to change at a moment's notice, the animals are all getting ready for courtship or mating, and it's simply gorgeous out. Today I saw an adult bald eagle fly by with a large stick in it's beak-- building a nest I presume. Although bald eagles are believed to mate for life, each year they will make 'improvements' to their nest by adding on more and more sticks until the tree can no longer support...