We had a wonderful week of weather, with (mostly) nice sea conditions and lots of sunshine. We also had lots of wonderful whale sightings, seeing killer whales on 6 of our 10 tours, and whales on all 10 of our tours, with some great humpback whale and gray whale encounters as well.
On Saturday morning’s tour on our zodiac boat, Sounder, we made the long trek down Saratoga passage to the Snohomish River Delta, where we were able to catch up with several gray whales. The long tour was extra worth it when one of these gray whales started spyhopping! It was so incredible to see this massive animal sticking its entire head up and out of the water several times, to get a look around. It was a sight to see.
On Sunday’s full day tour, we encountered the T049A family of Bigg’s orcas in Spieden Channel, where they had actually been all day long. We watched as the family 5 (the two oldest boys, T049A1 and T049A2 travel separately) were just facing right into the current, not really going anywhere, seemingly having a family snuggle session. After about 25 minutes of observing this same behavior, all the sudden all the whales took off towards the shoreline, right in towards a big gathering of Steller Sea Lions. We could see all of the sea lions get into the water (which they often do when the sense danger), and were all looking right towards the whales coming in. We saw the whales pop up right next to the sea lions and there was a bit of splashing and commotion. Then as soon as the excitement started, it was over, as the whales next headed right away from the sea lions back out into their “resting” mode. It was interesting to see the whales go in and out of a hunt so fast, perhaps they thought it would be funny just wanted to give the sea lions a good scare, or perhaps they thought they might be able to find one sea lion apart from the group they could take out. It’s hard to say. But it was certainly exciting, and interesting to watch!
Spring has been an awesome time to be on the water and our Anacortes whale watching tours have been great so far! We have more sunshine on the way this week so don’t miss your chance for a fun spring adventure!
