Y'all Seen Any Whales 'Round Here?

This past Labor Day Weekend, Bill, Aaron, and I traveled north (way north; like, a county away from Canada north) to Anacortes, WA to go whale watching out in the San Juan Islands. This trip was one of the things on our Washington to-do list and we thought this was probably the last opportunity we would have to do it before the weather started to cool off. We were right about that, because the day that we went, the weather was absolutely perfect. It was sunny with highs in the upper 70's on land which meant the upper 60's on water. The seas were calm as well, which made for great boating and whale watching.

Our boat, the Island Explorer II

I was concerned about taking Aaron out on the boat but I didn't want him to miss the experience, so we decided to chance it. He did great! We made sure he was bundled up and had a hat on so the wind couldn't get to his bald head. He wasn't really interested in the wildlife so much as how his toys would hold up on the boat but I think he had a good time anyway!

He even got his afternoon snooze in! Can you see his little feet?

As for the wildlife, we had some good views. On our way out to where the Orca pods were mainly swimming, we saw a Minke Whale. It happened so quickly, however, that we couldn't get a picture of it. A Harbor Seal also popped its little head out of the water. I got a picture of that! Be sure to click on the pictures to enlarge them so you can see more detail.

We finally reached where the Orcas were and were rewarded with several views. I wasn't sure what to expect and was a little disappointed that we didn't see more of them breaching as in this picture from Wikipedia:

The views we mostly got were of their dorsal fins and backs when they came up to the surface (these are our pictures):

For a girl who grew up in landlocked Missouri, however, it was all very exciting! To see these animals in their natural habitat and not in some zoo was very, very cool. I'm so glad we had the opportunity to see them. This is yet another reason why I'm going to hate leaving this great state.