Whale Watching!!

Tofino 

Puffin

Orca's

Orca

Mother and Baby

Group of  Sea Otters

Sea Otters 

Jamie's Whale Watching Marine Biologist

Soaked but happy!

This morning we had reservations for whale watching at Jamie's Whaling Station for 10:30 and it was supposed to be sunny today, BUT of course it was raining and rained a good part of our trip. We went on a large boat that is covered or you could sit up top which is uncovered. By the time we got onto the boat, we had to sit up top and am I glad we did, even if you are drenched by the time you get off. The people from down below were starting to come up once we started seeing the whales. We had picked the closest seats to the front without having an obstructed view. The captain was sitting right in front of us and had been talking to some of the staff on the other boats. You could tell he was wanting to take off out of harbour and get out on the ocean, they had been telling him about a group of whales, but he wasn't saying anything yet. We traveled for about 30 minutes through freezing cold rain, we could have almost used gloves, it was quite chilly. Once we came upon the spot he had been quickly getting to, he told us about the pod of transient Orca's that had been reported, they were there playing with the Sea Otters and feeding. There were 2 other boats there, the boats had formed a triangle around them with lots of room for the Orcas. The staff was announcing that they keep at least 100 meters away from any of the whales to give them space.  The orcas need to have room for their sonar waves to bounce around, their way of communicating with each other. There were quite a few rising to the top surface dozens of times, a mother and baby orca in the pod also. It was quite a treat to see and they said that this didn't happen very often, we picked the right day for our trip!! We stayed here watching the orcas for at least 20 minutes, then moved on back towards Tofino to see the Gray Whales. He had told us about the spot where the Gray Whales were earlier in our trip but wanted to see if he could find anything else, which was the Orcas we went to see and he knew about them. On the way, we found a group of Sea Otters, there had to have been about 20 of them, playing in the water, laying on their backs resting, really cute. I was just heading into the bathroom when I heard the staff member announcing the group of Otters, I raced back up to our seat to catch sight of them and take pictures.

Male sea lion sitting up on rock, others in water

Male sea lion

Gray Whale blowing water

Gray Whale 

Sea lions on shore

We headed once again to the Vargas Island, home of the Gray Whale, came across an island of sea lions. The proud male sea lion was sitting up on the rock, not moving at all as we came along. All the other sea lions were swimming in the water, diving under the water unsure of who we were,  climbing out on the rocks and making a lot of sounds. There had to have been at least 30 of them, another nice treat! There was a Bald Eagle sitting up in the tree, wonder if he was eyeing one of them up for lunch?? When we finally got to Vargas Island, we saw the spray of the Gray Whale and then she surfaced, her back rounding out and back in. We didn't see any flips of her tail, just her back, but we were happy with whatever we got. Also saw Tufted Puffin, only 23 breeding pairs, we think they meant in the world, but not sure. The captain said they rarely see these birds.

Rescue boat on top of our boat

Eagle on boat mast in harbour

Our tour boat

Starfish in harbour, different that the ones we've seen at Chesterman

Bat Starfish

End of our whale watching trip

This trip was SO WORTH IT!! I LOVED IT! The staff at Jamie's Whale Watching were so friendly and helpful and go out of their way to answer questions. They even offer coffee, tea, hot chocolate and cozy warm blankets on the boat all free of charge. I would go again tomorrow if I could. Even after being soaked through our jeans, wet hair and all, I'd do it again.

We leave Tofino tomorrow morning, sad that this part of our trip is over. I'll be back again someday Tofino, you are a Gem!! Probably to pick more seashells and driftwood also, maybe we should bring the trailer??

Talk to you tomorrow!!