09/18/17 – M/V Sea Lion – 12 PM
We left Friday Harbor with reports of whales North of Orcas Island. We headed in that direction and along the way we got some great looks at a number of different harbor porpoise pods. Harbors porpoises usually travel in groups of around four or five individuals but occasionally you will see larger congregations of them together in good feeding areas.
We reached the whale sighting and found the T101’s headed North towards Canada. The T101’s are a family of four; a mom and her three adult sons, one of which is an adopted son. This particular family has been hanging around this general area for the last couple of days. The family was pretty spread out, swimming parallel to each other over a far distance. We watched as the whales slowly traveled North together with very little wavering in their direction.
We were lucky enough to get a great last look at T101A, the twenty-four-year-old male son of T101. He slowly passed alongside our boat, giving our guests the opportunity to get an idea of how large these animals really are.
All in all, it was a beautiful day out on the water. We excepted it to be a bit rainy and cold but the weather changed in our favor and allowed us to enjoy a sunny day with orcas.
Naturalist, Rachel