A Whale of a Day

Our departure this morning was delayed by several hours as fog moved in and settled just as we were preparing to get underway. It was close to noon before we could pull anchor and motor out. The route from the Bunsby Islands to Kyuquot Sound would take us through the Barrier Islands, a wide spread group of islets that lay off shore for a good 15 miles or more along the coast. All of the guide books and the Canadian Sailing Directions stress that you must exercise caution transiting the area to avoid all of the obstacles. There was an inside shorter route, but it was not recommended in reduced visibility or rough conditions. And a more conservative route that takes you to the outside, but is much longer and exposed to potentially higher winds and ocean swell. It was a calm day with winds only at about 4-5 knots and the swell was predicted to be around 1 meter. Given that, we opted for the conservative route and in the end our choice paid off with many whale sightings throughout the day.

The first was a group of humpbacks making their way through the Barrier Islands on their way north. They were off about half a mile or so, but still very thrilling to see. And then, as we approached the entrance to Kyuquot Sound, there were two humpbacks right in the middle almost blocking our way into the sound. We diverted our course to make our way around them. They must have been feeding because they were continuously breaching and diving showing us their tail flukes as they went under. At one point, one of the whales breached just to the forward beam of the boat. Once past these bad boys, we entered the sound and a mile or so up another humpback surfaced just to our beam and was lazily swimming along on the surface going the same direction as us. We did our best to keep our distance and even went to neutral for a while. Eventually the whale went under and that was the last we saw of it. Janet snapped a few photos, so when we have wifi, we'll post them along with a few others.

We worked our way further into the sound to Dixie Cove where we dropped anchor for the night. The cove is accessed through a narrow channel and then there is an outer and an inner cove. We had our choice as there were no other boats and opted for the inner cove. Paul put a crab pot down and we settled in for the night.

A humpback whale breached just off our port bow.
Way cool!

This guy popped up on or starboard side and just followed
alongside for a few minutes before diving down.

When they blow, there's quite a load hiss noise,
especially when their so close.

We had to divert our course and manuver around
these guys who were blocking the entrance to
the sound.

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