Kula left for her second run of the day with so many reports to check out! There were reports as close as five minutes outside the harbour and a few more further out. We first looked for the close report but had no luck. Lucky for us there was another whale watching boat nearby that had found some for us! The whales we got to see were T063 Chainsaw and his mom T065 Whidbey II! These two were heading back in the opposite direction that we had seen them this morning. It seemed to be that they were just travelling when suddenly things took a turn!

They started moving faster and their movement became more sporadic. You could see the wiggle to their dorsals as they came to the surface, they moved their head back and forth, yup, they had started hunting!

Since both of these whales are older and more experienced it didn’t take long for them to finish off what was likely an unfortunate harbour seal who has carelessly crossed their path. To celebrate their kill and make sure we were enjoying ourselves both whales gave a nice spy-hop out of the water to check out their surroundings. We watched in awe at the huge size of Chainsaw's pectoral fins and the grace with which he can move for being such a massive whale. Whidbey II was an amazing sight to see as she copied her son in the smooth movement out of the water.

After leaving these two who continued their journey south we were going to the Gabriola Reef area which is a hot spot for seals and sea lions who are there to feed on the fish who call the reef home. Again we found an unfortunate seal who had crossed paths with some hungry orca, this time it was the T086As, T124As, and T124A1 hunting together at the reef. Since this pod contains some younger whales (two born only in 2021). When there are younger whales like this the pod will take a lot longer during the hunt as the more experienced whale teach the others how to properly make a kill. This hunt carried on for quite a while with us having to eventually leave them just as they finished the seal off. Hunting is usually when the whales are most active at the surface, doing rolls, tail slaps, breaches, and more to practice their techniques!

We did get to see some whale snacks on the way home with the harbour seals hauled out on the rocks but the whales definitely stole the show!

Our naturalist Val was able to capture some great photographs from this trip which you can see below!