Success!

Well, try #2 for whale watching was a success yesterday! I dare say it was because of my hat...The day started out cold and foggy, so we thought it might be another bust... but then a couple of hours into it- the fog lifted, and the sun came out. Then we were hot on the trail of the whales! We ended up seeing a bunch of different orca whales. Around the San Juan Islands, there are three resident pods of orcas- J, K, and L pod. We saw member of both J and K pods. We even got to see the newest baby orca, which was just born into K pod this spring! We did not get to see many behaviors from the whales- like breaching, but we did get to see some spyhopping and porpoising. Spyhopping is when the whale brings his head straight out of the water to take a look around and porpoising is when they are swimming so fast that their bodies come out of the water a little (like a dolphin). We did see one whale jump up a little after he caught a fish!


It was so awesome to see the whales... and they were also my first celebrity sighting! These whales were photographed and used as footage in Free Willy. We also got to see a Minke whale (a small baleen whale) swimming along. Did you know that killer whales can live 50+ years? Two of the whales in these pods are estimated to be over 90 years old! Also, the pods are family units, and once you are born into a pod you never leave it. Also, the mother is the leader. Finally, we also learned that even though killer whales are able to kill other whales, they do not fight with each other. They are not territorial like that. Also, not all whales eat sea lions like you see on tv. Only some killer whale groups do this, while others eat only fish (like the ones we saw today). All in all, it was a really fun day!