Free Willy!

17/06/15

After our bumper day yesterday the last thing I wanted to do was go kayaking but we’d already booked and paid for an all day Johnson Straight tour, so after some grumbling and general sights of discontent, we arrived at North Shore Kayak. Rory and I were the only ones on the tour and after a quick “kayaking for dummies” introduction we were out on the water.

When we left the dock it was quite cloudy but it didn’t take long for the clouds to burn off, leaving us with the most amazing day. It was sunny with a slight breeze and the water was completely still which made exploring the shoreline that much nicer.

As we were the only ones on the tour we could set the pace and decide when to stop. We paddled to shore to explore a little archipelago which turns in to an island when the tide rises. I absolutely love looking in rock pools and the place was teaming with wildlife, we even saw a little pd of porpoises playing just off shore.

The rest of the day was spent kayaking in the sun, watching the local wildlife and chatting to our guide. The tour is advertised as an opportunity to kayak with killer whales but we were well aware that the whale sightings don’t start until July so I didn’t have any hopes or expectations. We were thinking of stopping for lunch when all of a sudden, we spotted something on the horizon.  A whale watching boat was making a turn and heading toward us. It was a moment of pure excitement and disbelief – there was a pod of killer whales, heading right for us. Local wildlife protection rules state that you can’t get too close to the whales so we stopped paddling and just watched them. There were between 3 and 5 whales, swimming past and sitting in the water, at their level, listening to them as the surfaced and dove was amazing. I did try to get a few shots and videos but the waterproof camera isn’t great so you’ll just have to take my word for it – or better yet, come to Johnson Straight and see them for yourself!

After all that excitement we found a nice cove, parked up the kayaks and had lunch – ours was bought from the Seahorse Cafe and was delicious. There were plenty of rockpools to explore and I even found this little creature – I’m not sure what he’s called but he looks like a furry woodlouse on top and a limpet underneath! Reluctantly we began the kayak home, seeing plenty of sea creatures, eagles and porpoises on our way. Being on the water and in the sun put me in the mood to go swimming so when our guide suggested going swimming I eagerly agreed. When we got back we put on our wetsuits, made our way to the end of the dock and jumped in to the freezing B.C water! It was cold but not much worse than Ballyholme so I was in my absolute element. Rory’s a big chicken so he stayed on dry land while I frolicked in the water, hopefully he enjoyed his second whale sighting of the day because I sure enjoyed canon-balling off the dock!

In towns as small as Telegraph Cove and Port McNeil there isn’t much in the way of eateries so we headed to the grocery store, bought some supplies and went back to the B&B where we tried some salmon our host had caught and had smoked – dinner from within a 2 mile radius is definitely the way forward!