Friday - July 10th - Trip to see ORCAS in the Wild!

Friday morning - July 10th! The highlight of our week in Blaine!! Going out to see the Orca Whales! We had seen them in 2002 - but Grandma hadn't & we also didn't have as good of a camera as we do now.....would that help?? I'll let you be the judge...but I'm pretty satisfied (with the camera anyway...the camerawoman left a bit to be desired at times! ;)


Amie and Daddy walking on the pier waiting for the captain to check us onto the boat!

Hold my hand Daddy! Look - I can see myself!

Tim waiting to board the boat.

Grandma ready to board the boat! The Mystic Sea!

All Aboard & pulling away from Anacortes! We are ready to see the gorgeous Pacific Northwest & their fantastic Orca Whales (and a few other creatures!). As we were leaving port, we got a good view of Mt. Baker!

We hadn't gone very far when our little miss fell asleep! Which is a very good thing...because she is a crab extraordinaire without a nap!!

One of the little islands we passed was chok full of seals! The captain said there were baby seals on the island as well, but we couldn't really tell which ones were the babies! It actually looked like a bunch of dead seals at first, because they were so motionless!

These two little fellas were in the water swimming - a couple of the few that actually moved while we were watching them.

Another view of Mt. Baker

Tim and Grandma watching for whales - or just the scenery!

Amie called this the baby boat!!

As we were heading towards the area where the Orcas were, we actually ran into a pod of Minke whales. Minke whales are large baleen whales that feed off of krill, plankton & small fish that they filter through their baleen bristles.

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This is a picture of one off of the internet - because the next picture after this image of the whale is what we actually saw.
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Here's what we saw.....see the little fin and the hump in front of it? Yup that's what we saw...we are told these were the Minke Whales! Our naturist on board the ship talked about how gentle and graceful these whales are. It would have been nice to have seen them a little better - but we learned alot about them & they were the bonus for the trip!

In the area of the Minke whales - there were a ton of birds flying and sitting about. This guy was really close to the boat & just kind of sat there!

Notice anything a little odd about this group of birds sitting in the water?

Look a little closer......it's a seal! I have no idea how he got all that way out into the water. There were no islands anywhere near. I hope he made it back to his safety before a predator got him!!

We also saw several of these pretty little jelly fish. They are different then the yellow jelly fish that the boys had seen on our first trip to Washington in '97.

And Tim thought the gulls sitting on logs out in the water were funny! He thought they looked like they were surfing! Surf's up dude!!

We finally made it!!! We were in the straight that Orca Pod J was using to herd the salmon for feasting on today!! Everyone rushed out to the bow of the boat! The first few we saw were so very active! My first awesome picture was actually of a breach!! I was so excited - I wasn't sure if I had even caught it!! But take a look for yourself! It is spectacular!

The next several are just pictures of the Orca's being Orca's!! The show was incredible!

The naturalist also told us that there were two baby Orca's in the pod this summer. But because they were both less than 2 years old, they would not name them because the death rate is so high for baby Orcas, especially for first time moms! That was sad...here's one of the babies!

And here is the only image I caught of a tail! Like I said - camera good....camera woman - not so good!!

Dad, Amie & Grandma came out on the bow to get a better look at the Orcas!

I have several pictures of splashes (like this one) - where I don't get my camera turned quick enough to get the breach.....just the splash!!

One bit of not-so-fun excitement came when a speedboat came straight at the pod & almost played chicken with the leading Orca! Right after this shot, he reved his engine and cut to the right quickly....but don't worry!

Not only did we see the Orcas surface on the back side of his boat.....we saw the police go after him!! Turns out it is probably a $50,000 fine for what he did!!

The next 5 pictures are quick shutter of one Orca moving back into the water after breathing.

I just thought this one was kind of cool because it has the spray of water coming out of the blow hole!

What an awe-inspiring day to see one of God's most beautiful creations - the Orca Whales! It was a glorious day & definitely the highlight of our week in the Pacific Northwest!

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On the way back to the port - this picture was so cool with the sail boat in the foreground of Mt. Baker!