Discovery Marine Safaris delivers another incredible whale watching adventure

By Keith and Heather Nicol

We had never seen a humpback spy hop before

     A few years ago we had an epic whale watching trip with Discovery Marine Safaris (DMS) which is based in Campbell River. On that trip we had Orcas swim right up and under our  boat – the Tenacious III  and we even saw them circling around a small rocky island that had seals on it who were trying not to become dinner.  For details on that blog post and a video see: https://keithnicol.blogspot.com/2016/09/for-unforgettable-whale-watching-check.html   

      On August 30 we decided to try another trip with DMS and they just happened to have room for us on their August 31 sailing. The weather forecast was not in our favour with rain showers forecast for the morning but we headed off anyway hoping that it would clear. As we checked in for our 8:30 am trip we could also see fog off shore obscuring the view of Quadra Island across Discovery Passage.  Captain John told us it was the first fog of the fall and that he would flip a coin to see which way he would turn going out the harbour.  After picking up 2 passengers on Quadra Island the coin told him to head south which proved to be a great choice.  While we steamed through the fog Roleen, our on board naturalist ,told us about what we might see and we discovered that our group hailed from all points of the world including Australia, The Netherlands, Germany, Nova Scotia, Alberta and there was even a family from China!

The Tenacious III has an upper and lower deck which is a bonus

        Once we rounded the southern end of Quadra Island the fog disappeared and the sun even began to poke through the clouds. We wove our way past Marina Island and along the shore of Cortes Island and Roleen pointed out Whaletown where ironically whaling had previously occurred.  We then headed for Sutil Channel and in no time we had reports of several humpbacks ahead. John kept his distance stopping 700 meters away. We could see the blows of at least 4-5 whales and we waited. Slowly the whales made their way toward us and then split into 2 groups.  A group of 3 continued right toward us and before we knew it they were passing underneath the Tenacious III!! Amazing since that is exactly what had happened on our earlier trip with the Orcas. From the upper deck we could see the faint outline of the whales in the water and then they spy hopped to check us out. Yikes, we were eye ball to eye ball with 25 tons of whale!  Roleen told us that humpbacks are making a real come back in these waters and last year whale watching companies from Campbell River identified 86 different humpbacks. She told she could readily identify the following whales: Chinook, Columbia, Cirque, and Checkmate. 

Columbia takes a dive

  We then steamed south west toward Quadra Island where we saw 2 more humpbacks and then motored south to Mitlenatch Island, which is a protected nature park known for its nesting sea birds, haul outs for sealions and seals as well as even having unusual plants like the prickly pear cactus!.  We saw several huge stellar sea lions on a small island just off shore and then it was time to head back to Campbell River.  We didn`t see any Orcas on this trip but the humpback display was unforgettable. Thanks to Captain John and Roleen for making this such a memorable trip. It certainly easy to recommend  Discovery Marine Safaris for the personalized trips that they put on.  They will be offering whale watching trips through the end of September and they are now starting their grizzly bear tours as well so you might want to check that out as well. For more information and to book your trip see:   https://www.adventurewhalewatching.com/

Stellar sea lions on Mitlenatch Island

                                                Video of our whale watching tour