Welcome to the Whale Report Blog

Levi Vandebunte | M/V Sea Lion | July 17th, 2026 | 5:30pm

This tour turned right out of Roche Harbor, and within minutes had sights of Killer Whales! The T65B family was swimming West through Spieden Channel. This is one of my personal favorite families, so I was super excited! They are a family of four whales, and are led by their mother/matriarch "Chunk". She travels with her three sons, "Birdsall", "Nettle", and "Rook". I was especially interested to get some looks at T65B2 "Nettle", as he has...

Olivia Ellman | M/V Kestrel | July 17th, 2026 | 2:00 pm

Today’s Adventure Tour set some milestones for my season… My first time being the first one to spot whales! This afternoon was full of surprises, and has to be one of my top trips of the season. We departed Friday Harbor with plans to head north where we had reports of Killer Whales across the Canadian border. As we began to pick up speed out of the harbor, I suddenly spotted dorsal fins about 300m off our starboard side!! A group of Bigg’s...

Lauren Tschirhart | July 16th, 2026 | M/V Kestrel | 11:00 am

We have a new tour offering here at San Juan Safaris’s. We are now running full day whale watching excursions. Instead of our normal 3 to 4 hour tour, we are now offering an extended 5 to 6 hour adventure. Today was our very first all day tour of the season, and although the weather was not on our side, the whales definitely were. Not only were there thunderstorms in the forecast, which is something extremely rare here in the Salish Sea...

Kelly | M/V Osprey | July 17th, 2026 | 12:30 pm 

The overcast sky cleared as we departed Friday Harbor and took a left into San Juan Channel. Cruising up the channel we were treated to scenic looks at Turtleback mountain on Orcas island. Our first stop of the tour being a harbor seal hotspot known as White Rock. We watched as this cluster of seals clung to the rocky shoreline on the left side of the formation. So many newborn pups visible next to mom! We next slipped over the border into Canada...

Lauren Tschirhart | July 15th, 2026 | M/V Osprey | 12:30 pm

In the interislands of the Salish Sea, it is not often that we get the opportunity to see multiple humpbacks traveling together. Therefore, our encounter today was quite special. We got word that three humpback whales were seen swimming together in Presidents Channel. We departed Friday Harbor and wasted no time getting to that report. We zoomed north through San Juan Channel and Spring Passage and made our way on scene. These three...

Aly Liu | M/V Kestrel | July 15, 2026 | 2:00 pm 

Today was the epitome of what we call an adventure tour full of diverse wildlife, with sunshine and smiles circulating M/V Kestrel. We did not have to go very far to make our first stop; not one, not two, but THREE backs of the humpies (humpback whales). These Megaptera novaeangliae were traveling south down San Juan Channel, where we crossed paths at Rocky Bay. Seeing the sequence of three 15-20 foot blows gracefully erupt in a straight line was...

Olivia Ellman | M/V Osprey | July 14th, 2026 | 12:30 pm

What a gorgeous day on the water, full of so many different species in our incredible ecosystem. There were some whale reports in Canadian waters when we departed the dock, so we began our travels south towards Victoria. We were immediately greeted by stunning views of Mt. Baker as we entered San Juan Channel, and saw many sea birds and seals as we neared Cattle Pass. We continued our cetacean scanning as we entered Salmon Bank and the...

Levi Vandebunte | M/V Kestrel | July 14th, 2026 | 2:00pm

We left the dock feeling quite confident today, as several species of whales had been reported South of us in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Luckily for us, that area happened to be extremely calm on this day. We entered beautiful and glassy waters as we passed by Cattle Point Lighthouse. Our first stop was to view two Humpback Whales just a couple of minutes South of San Juan Island. We approached slowly and turned our engines off, and these...

Olivia Ellman | M/V Kestrel | July 13th, 2026 | 2:00 pm

Our adventure tour today was full of surprises as we journeyed through the Salish Sea in both US and Canadian waters. We had a few reports of whales further in the Canadian Gulf Islands when we departed, so we began by heading north and wanted to wait and see how things were changing as we got closer. Once we reached Spieden, we continued west and then decided to cross the Haro towards Sidney in Vancouver Island. We soon reached the vicinity...

Lauren Tschirhart | July 13th, 2026 | M/V Osprey | 1:30 pm

Today’s tour was filled with tons of spectacular sightings. We got to observe three different orcas and our tour ended with an unexpected humpback whale sighting. Who doesn’t love surprise whales? The M/V Osprey departed Friday Harbor and headed north in San Juan Channel. Our first wildlife sighting was of several harbor porpoise surfacing to the port side of our vessel. These porpoise surfaced several times, giving most of our guests the...