Breaching Orca

Today has been a complete and absolute dream day with the orcas.
Breaching is not a particular common behavior for the Orca in this area, but we had a day with lots of spyhopping and lots of breaching. And no rain!!
Breaching is a behavior the Southern Resident killerwhales do more often, to clean themselves from parasites, sort of like scratching themselves, where the Northen Resident have rubbing beaches - small round pebble beaches, where they will rub themselves on the small rocks. Two different behaviors, same result..
It looks so easy for these amazingly beautiful animals to jump out of the water, but truth is, it takes a lot of energy for them to jump out of the water like that..
And I'm not going to lie, I really love life up here, especially when the wildlife puts on a show like they sis today.
The orca has been absent in the area for a couple of days, and we have had to 'settle' for humpbacks...
But they came back with a vengeance today -
Our explanation for this was that they missed us when they were gone for a few days...
The real explanation could be that they had lots of good salmon these past days and have lots of energy..
I am still leaning towards the first one though... :)
Later in the day we went to hang out with some humpbacks and they also were breaching all over the place, and playing with sealions - good fun! and lots of action!
We are leaving for a three day camping trip tuesday morning, hopefully with good weather and lots of beautiful scenery, and of course great wildlife..


Stellar Sealion

Humpback playing

Humpback tailfluke

Surf scoters

Orca Breach

Orca calf

Orca Porpoising

Orca spyhop

Time warp

I finally have a little time to give an update to my trip.

The time up here in wildlife heaven seems to have its own life. I feel like I have only been here for a short while and yet it seems as though I never left this place last fall.

Finally after a week with overcast skies and heavy wind, the weather cleared up and hit 29 degrees. I spent 3 days on a big boat, sailing up a stunning inlet called Knight Inlet. A place with extraordinary scenery, turqoise water, mountains that shoot up straigt from the water, impressive waterfalls, abandoned logging camps and ghost villages. All subject to some interesting photography, so as you can imagine I shot every angle there was of all the worn down houses.
Today I have had the - for now - most fantastic Orca experience.
Absolutely on my top 3 list of awesome days up here!

We were in the boat, watching a pod of orcas and they were all over the place, going left and right, taking long dives and we had absolutely no idea where they would come to the surface next. All of a sudden they popped up right next to our boat, only about three meters from us, circling around us, spyhopping, and they stayed there for 30 minutes. They were lying on the surface, completely still and peaceful, just breathing heavily and looking at us. One came right up to the boat, almost touching the front.
Those 30 minutes were absolutely stunning and special.
My heart was racing, and the feeling of being so close to them is hard to explain, but I wish that you could all have been here to witness this with me.

To top it off we went looking for humpback whales and found not only one, but 6 of them, and one came pretty damn close to our boat, and those guys are huge.....
Also we had a great dolphin moment today where 50 or more pacific whitesided dolphins passed us 4 times in high speed.
We found and photographed a Minke whale that hasn't yet been seen in this area.. If you get the first photos of both the left and the right side of the whales back and dorsal fin, you actually get to name it...
Anyways, thats all for now.
Enjoy the photos :)



Orca saying hello


Unidentified minke

Curious orca

Surf Scoters

Baby orca spyhop

Pacific whitesided dolphin - under water

Knight Inlet

Someones family - someones life

Abandoned hotel on Minstrel Island

Baby bald eagle in the sunset

Stellar Sealions in sunset

Stallar Sealions enjoying the sunset

Humpback tail fluke in the sunset - so 80's

Orca

Tail fluke - Humpback whale

Guests on the zodiac wathing Dahls porpoises

Fin of a humpback whale

Harbour seal

Bald eagle in the rain

Grizzly mother and cub playing

Grizzly mother and cub

Grizzly mother and cub, playing

Bald Eagle takeoff

Perfect cure for jetlag..

After a long day of sitting on a couple of airplanes, US customs - which by the way is a journey of its own - a friend picked me up in Vancouver airport. Great to see a familiar face, great to see a familiar city, great to be back to my second home in the world - Canada!
I slept for a couple hours got up at 5.30 to get the first flight to the northern part of Vancouver Island, Port Hardy.
The fog up north made it difficult to land, and it wasn't until 30 minutes before expected arrival, that we actually got permission to land.
Wildlife viewing began the second the tiny plane hit the ground...Two bald eagles were sitting next to the the runway, almost like a welcome back greeting. I didn't care that the weather was overcast, foggy, and cold..
The smile on my face and the tears in my eyes would have said it all to any stranger.
Angela did a surprise pick-up at the airport, so great to see her again.
Feels like it was only yesterday I was here, and not much has changed in this great little town of Port McNeill..
Once we came back to Port McNeill, we were in a hurry to get things ready for the tour of the day. I threw my bags in Angelas house, changed into some warmer clothes, we made lunchbags and packed all the stuff for the tour, and jumped out the door within 20 minutes.
Back in the routine of being a deckhand and assistant for the whale watching tours with Ocean Rose Coastal Adventures! Being slightly (read: very) affected by jetlag, we packed a couple of RedBull so I would survive the day without falling a sleep, we hit the water, searching for whales and other wildlife.
And that first day on the water was pretty awesome! We saw every single species of wildlife (almost), humpback whales, minke whales, orca, eagles, bears, seals, sealions, porpoise, dolphins! I am home!
We came back around 5 in the afternoon, packed the boat down, and then we had a welcome back party/box fire in the backyard/ keeping Jannie awake plan that included a lot of gin&tonic and some canoeing in banana canoes on the grass in the backyard (don't ask...)
I found that the best cure for jetlag is getting drunk so it's possible to sleep through the first night...
Works every time!
Here are some pictures from the first day on the water.
Enjoy!


Seagulls attacking a bateball (small fish in a ball under water - the divingbirds, murres, aucklets etc are attacking from underneath)


Black bear on the beach - he spotted us...


Bald eagle


Two humpback whales


Harbour seals, hanging out.



Blowhole on a humpback


Common Murres, waiting for food


Humpback whale


A humpback whale surfacing, eating small fish from a bateball


Stellar Sealions fighting and roaring to get the best spot on the dry cliff

Orca surfacing close to the boat.

Orca playing.