Welcome to the Whale Report Blog

Piper | Thursday, July 11, 2019 | M/V Sea Lion | 5:30 PM

On this evening’s sunset cruise, we had two really lovely groups of folks visiting the Salish Sea for the first time! The M/V Sea Lion motored out of Friday Harbor and north through San Juan Channel, passing by some wee harbor porpoises and harbor seals swimming along the channel. Our destination was Plumper Sound amongst Canada’s Southern Gulf Islands where a hodgepodge of Bigg’s killer whales were hanging out together!

We...

Jordan | M/V Sea Lion | 07/11/19 | 1:30pm

WOW! Today was unbelievable. We saw so much wildlife, it was fantastic.

Captain Erick, Naturalist Piper and I took our vessel, the Sea Lion out of Friday Harbor and headed up north through the San Juan Channel. We boated all the way up to Boundary Pass near Moresby Island where we saw orca whales!

Here we saw our first pod of orcas identified as the T77s! This group consisted of 5 whales including one of the newest members of the entire...

Olivia | July 10th, 2019 | M/V Kestrel | 11:00am

We had the most adventurous ‘Adventure Tour’ yet this season! Gearing up for the trip, Captain Brian decided to take a risk and head towards our only Killer Whale reports down in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, almost bordering Haro Strait. On our way south near Cattle Point, we stopped at Whale Rocks to view Harbor Porpoises (which we saw right at the dock) and many sea birds such as Cormorants. Here’s where the adventure truly began! It...

Olivia | July 9th, 2019 | M/V Sea Lion | 5:30pm

For our rainy sunset tour, Captain Gabe immediately started heading south past the Cattle Point Lighthouse down into the Strait of Juan de Fuca where we had far away whale sightings from earlier in the day. While he was determined to show our passengers whales, I started handing out rain slickers and heaps of blankets for our hour and 15-minute trek south. While on route, we spotted Harbor Seals and Harbor Porpoises swimming about which...

M/V Sea Lion | July 9th, 2019 | Naturalist Alexandria | 1:30 PM

What a fantastic day this trip ended up being!  We left the dock with reports of orcas on the cusp of our range, and decided that we would go for it!  After checking with all of our friends on board we decided that if we had the chance of seeing orcas today it was absolutely worth the trek!

We headed south into the Strait of Juan de Fuca and worked our way past numerous banks towards where these reports came from.

As we...

Laura C. | 7-9-2019 | M/V Kestrel | 11:00am

A picturesque mountainous scene was in store for all aboard M/V Kestrel today!  The weather along the Salish Sea turned swells and whitecaps of the Pacific Ocean into transparent glass, creating a mirror image of all the beauty surrounding our vessel.  This sparkling emerald liquid was a nice contrast to the rocky snowy edges of Mount Baker and northern jagged mountain ranges.  Our boat sliced a clean cut through the water as we made our...

Olivia | July 8th, 2019 | M/V Kestrel | 3:00pm

Perk of being on the 3:00pm tour, is that our 11:00am has already scoped out the area to know where our potential whale sightings are. Captain Pete and I were confident on seeing both Humpback Whales and Killer Whales up in Boundary Pass, so we started off by heading north through the San Juan Channel to find them! We ended up near the same family group as this morning, the T65A’s, and watched as they milled around and provided us with...

Jordan | M/V Sea Lion | 07/08/19 | 1:30pm

What a really fantastic day out on the water! The sun was out but there were clouds in the distance painting the horizon with beautiful puffy whiteness. Captain Gabe, Naturalist Erin and I set out of Friday Harbor on our vessel and headed north through the San Juan Channel to reports of wildlife.

Boating near Waldron Island, we stopped by a place called White Rocks where we found a bunch of harbor seals! There were literally mounds of seals...

Olivia | July 8th, 2019 | M/V Kestrel | 11:00am

Captain Pete and I started off the trip by heading north towards Boundary Pass where we caught word of some potential whale sightings. On our way there we decided to stop at White Rocks and catch a glimpse at some Harbor Seals. Did you know that anywhere from 10 days to 2 weeks after they give birth to their pups, the males swoop in to breed all over again? Ouch. Am I right, moms? 

As we continued further up peeking into Boundary...

Erin | M/V Sea Lion | Sunday, July 7, 2019 | 5:30 PM

What a wonderful evening we had in the Salish Sea! When we left Friday Harbor, the rain was starting to slow down and we could see the sun trying to peak out of the clouds. We were excited because we were heading to the area we had seen orcas in on our previous trip. We headed north out of Friday Harbor and saw lots of harbor porpoises as we headed through San Juan Channel. They were popping up all around our boat and everyone was...