Salmon Bank was the place to be today. We headed south out of Friday Harbor, prepared for rain but pleasantly surprised that it stopped just as we left our boat slip. Along our way we stopped to view a large group of harbor seals hauled out. A few gave us a demonstration of how phocids, true seals, move around on land without being able to rotate their hind flippers under their body by scooting off the rocks into the water. Continuing south, we slowed by Goose Island to watch and...

Unfortunately there were no reports or sightings of Orcas whales in the region today, but we did get to see an amazing amount of other marine and terrestrial wildlife! We traveled approximately 50 miles round trip visiting Spieden Island, Mandarte, Turn Point (Stewart Island), and Patos Island. On Spieden we found some Mouflon Sheep and a couple Bald Eagles along with numerous Harbor Seals hauled out on small, rocky islets. At Mandarte, we engaged in hundreds of Cormorants building...

Today we visited five Orca Whales on the western side of D’Arcy Island (48°04.14N, 123°18.21W). As we approached the scene we could immediately tell they were Transients based on their stealthy behavior. Once they went under no one knew when, or where, they would come up next. After continually changing paths they unexpectedly surfaced right towards our boat providing us with a great amount of excitement and the most amazing view! There was one LARGE male, his dorsal fin standing...

Harbor seals were taking advantage of the low tide today and were seen hauled out at a number of locations in the San Juan Islands. We counted 97 Harbor Seals at just one haul-out site along the west side of Waldron Island!

One mile northwest of Patos Island Lighthouse we were surrounded by Harbor Porpoise. These normally shy and elusive animals were busy foraging in this highly productive area.  Their behavior of surfacing frequently and changing directions provided excellent...

Today we followed a similar route to yesterday’s trip. We headed north out of the San Juan Channel, past the west side of Waldron and out to Patos Island. About a half mile west of Patos we saw around 20 to 30 Harbor Porpoises milling in the rip tides. This appeared to be a great foraging area and it was very cool too see so many Harbor Porpoises together in one place. As we reached East Point we saw a similar set-up to yesterday with about 100 Harbor Seals hauled out on the left...

Today was amazing! Before the boat even left the slip, we saw a curious little harbor seal poke his head out of the water to check us out. Then, we actually left Friday Harbor and headed north towards Spieden Island where we saw mouflon sheep at the southern point. Along the island there was a group of sika deer right by the water's edge, and a couple of babies running along next to their mothers. At the end of Spieden there was a bald eagle perched at the top of the tallest tree...

The name of the game today was Harbor. Harbor Seals and Harbor Porpoises were everywhere in the Salish Sea today. We started by heading north out of Friday Harbor. Our first stop was Spieden Island, where we saw not only mouflon sheep and sika deer, but at least six bald eagles flying over the tree tops. Two of them left the island and flew straight over our boat! We also spotted harbor seals everywhere! They were hauled out on just about every rocky island. We then headed towards...

Today’s trip we began by heading west through the San Juan and Shaw Channels. As we passed between Lopez Island and San Juan Island we stopped at a rock that was covered on one half with Steller Sea Lions and the other half with Harbor Seals. There was also a lone Bald Eagle present, overlooking the rock. The passengers were thrilled!

We then looped around San Juan to the west side and were able to catch up with four individuals from J-Pod. There was one large male, a female, and two...

Today was one of those rare, perfect days to be out in the Salish Sea. First, all the conditions were in our favor; the weather was warm, sunny, and the seas were calm and almost windless. Second, the wildlife was abundant; we spotted a large group of six to seven transient killer whales identified as T18s just outside of Friday Harbor. The transients were more active than usual, tail slapping, rolling around, and spy hopping. After taking a good look at the whales we were able to...

With early news of orca spottings, today’s tour headed north towards the U.S./Canadian international border.  Once we reached Turn Point we saw a few boats in the area and began our search. Within a quick ten minutes we had spotted two members of J-pod, our southern residents, and were able to follow them, watching them mill around and rise above the water's surface.

After about twenty minutes we moved on with our search and headed back southwest. It only took a couple hundred yards...