A highlight of my trip was my visit to Victoria on Vancouver Island, a short journey away by seaplane, and the prospect of seeing some wildlife.
It was the first time I’d ever been in a seaplane and the prospect filled me both with excitement and nervousness. I’d felt seasick on a helicopter trip in Barbados, what if I threw up in this tiny plane?
I needn’t have worried because, though noisy and packed in a little too closely for comfort – especially in these covid times – the 35 minute plane ride over to Vancouver Island was quite smooth. And just as we reached Victoria, the sun came out.
I walked around this capital of British Columbia for a little while taking in the quiet, wide boulevards so characteristic of Canada, and visiting Christ Church Cathedral. It was so quiet and laid-back and unhurried and I took to it immediately.
Of course the reason I was in Victoria and the high spot of my day was the whale watching trip with Orca Spirit Adventures on a small, covered boat in the straights south of Victoria, on the border with the USA. In fact my phone picked up a US roaming signal at one point.
The boat crew use a naturalists’ app and the local seafarers’ grapevine to locate the migrating whales on their annual trip southwards to their winter feeding grounds off Mexico and Hawaii, where they also breed. At one point I didn’t think I was going to see any whales at all and, with 18 people crowded on deck on the small boat, it was difficult to get any pictures but I’m quite pleased with what I did get.
A little later we also saw two baby Orca (we know they were babies because of their lack of motor skills, apparently.) What a privilege it was to capture them on film in the wild, surely they only place that they should be captured at all.
On the way back we passed Race Rocks and their little lighthouse, home to colonies of Harbour Seals, California Sealions and Stellar Seals. The boat was escorted at times by Murres, Gulls and Cormorants. This day was a high point of my Around the World trip. I’d love to do it again but perhaps on a warmer day and with fewer people. It was the experience of a lifetime.
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