Sunsets and Whales

July 14th, 2019

As the day started off, I was unsure what the weather would bring us. The preious two days had provided local boaters with flat seas. What would the chances of a third day in row be. I checked the forecast, and it was showing a promising 5 – 15 knots, with a minimal chance of rain. As it turned out, the weather would not let us down.

We started our day at 9 am, with me picking up a couple and their lovely daughter at a their accommodation. We headed to the boat launch, and headed out on the water after a short safety briefing. It was one of those magical days on the ocean, flat calm. We crossed Chatham sound without a drop of water splashing on the window. We arrived at our location, a secluded beach, on the open shores of Hecate Strait. We unloaded our gear and got ready to go kayaking. We had a fun packed day a head of us. We enjoyed an easy paddle around the rugged, exposed, and rocky islands, exploring the beaches, finding washed up treasures, and watching the eagles sore in the sky. After a nice beach rest and exploration, the group decided to continue on around the corner further, and do some more exploring. We explored a neat little inlet, with a river a the end, which was a perfect spot for a bear sighting. Unfortunately, no bears would present themselves today. We turned around, and it was decided to head back to our main camp area, start a fire, have some lunch, and roast some smokies, and marsh mallows.

We arrived at our camp, I lit a fire, and we sat around, drinking tea and coffee, discussing the adventures of our paddle, and we planned our next activities. I suggested paddle boarding, and snorkeling. After a short introductory lesson on paddle boarding, including how to start and stand up, they were off to the races. A few wobbly knees at first, but after a few minutes, confidence improved, and success!

After they were done paddle boarding, I would bring them to one of my secret beaches, where the sea anemone, abalone, sea stars, crab, giant mussels, and chiton are plentiful, and provide ample opportunities for all to see. This is a special beach. It is completely hidden by rocky outcrops, and only accessible at low tide. As the tide retreats, slowly the beach presents itself, like a sunrise peaking up from the horizon. Low tide was at 6:30 pm. We hiked into the beach, and as we climbed through the draining flood passages, we rounded a corner and slowly, hundreds of years of broken barnacles, many feet deep, started to come into view. For a moment, if you didn’t know you were in the Pacific Northwest, you would think you were on a tropical beach. Unfortunately, the tide was not a spectacularly large tide, so surge channels would not completely drain yielding the full beach for exploring. However, there was still a bounty to explore, even at a nominal tide. After some time exploring, checking out the marine life that was swarming in the tidal pools, and on the freshly exposed rocks, it was time to think about heading back.

Time had flown by, and it was now 7:30 pm. We still had a 1 hr boat journey back to the dock, and we wanted to be back before dark. So we started packing up. After loading the boat, securing the gear, we started our way back to town.

We did not get very far, before I stopped the boat and motor. As we were traversing a tight little channel, off to side, was a rock with a rookery of seals lying on the rock, enjoying the calm evening, after a day of gorging themselves on fish. There were adults and baby seals, still covered in white fur. After watching the seals, hearing them grunt and groan, it was time to start on our way again.

The weather was beautiful, and the sun was trying its hardest to show its self through the clouds. We headed our way into Chatham sound for the crossing. About a quarter of the way through the journey across the sound, from the back of the boat I heard some yell whales. I looked off to our Port side and about 1 km away there were a couple humpbacks. There was a very large whale, and a smaller whale we thought might have been a calf. As we got closer to the whales, still outside the legal approach distance, I shut the engines off and we floated. We were rewarded with beautiful sightings of perfect tail shot as the large whale descended to depths feeding. The second whale just continued to play on the surface of the water, playing, rolling, and waiving its peck fin and tail fin. The larger whale surfaced west of us and continued on swimming south almost out of sight.

They must have been calling each other under the water, because the smaller whale we had been watching, started swimming towards our boat, from hundreds of yards away, and eventually, swam under our boat and surfaced about 50 yards south of us. It turned out the larger whale had decided to swim back towards us and behind us. We got some lovely photos of the whales, and the sunset which gave some spectacular views. One could not ask for a better day, watching whales feeding and playing, in a perfectly flat sea, with one of the most beautiful sun settings.

It was now 9:45 pm, sunset was fast approaching and we had to get moving to return to dock before dark. After the whales were a far enough distance, I started the motor, and we headed back to dock. We were all satisfied, we got to witness one of the most beautiful sunsets with whales playing in the background, after a fun filled day of kayaking and beach exploring.