Day 5 - Whales & the glorious Khutze Salt Marsh

Today started with a 7am kayak for those that wanted to do this before we set off down Princess Royal Channel to Khutze Inlet. Soon after leaving our anchorage at Home Bay, Brian saw two whale blows from humpbacks logging (sleeping on the surface).

They were not easily aroused although we hung in there for a good 20 minutes or so, watching them blow before sinking a little, then lying quietly on or just below the surface. Although relaxing for them and for us, a tugboat was coming down the channel towing a very large tanker – Brian radio’d them, and they moved away from the centre of the channel. The whales were safe.

Janet, one of our passengers with great spotting skills, saw a whale breach a little behind us, then another – interspersed with massive splashes as the humpback slapped his pectoral fin on the surface. By the time we got close enough to photograph all this activity, the pattern became clear: pectoral fin slapping from one fin, two gentle blows followed by a deep dive showing the tail fluke – and then several minutes later a breach, sometimes followed by a second one.

We watched this repeated over and over – the whale was close to the rock-lined shoreline, and each pectoral fin slap onto the surface of the sea, reverberated off the rocks sounding like a gunshot – just stunning. If this display was intended to attract attention, it succeeded with us. If it was to stun fish so that the whale could eat them, then it probably succeeded with this too.

I can watch humpbacks breaching over and over – it’s always amazing to see a giant mammal propel itself out of the sea. We lost count of the number of times it had done this. Then it stopped suddenly, the “routine” ending with a deep dive that lasted at least 10 minutes, the whale surfacing quietly as it moved away from us. Perhaps it had had its fill of fish.

Around 2pm we arrived at Khutze Inlet - we changed into our wet weather gear and boarded the zodiacs for a cruise into this massive estuary.

This is a beautiful place – big mountains reaching to the sky, some with snow up high, and large areas of land surrounded by tidal waterways, rapidly increasing in depth as the tide filled the inlet. We were in grizzly bear territory, and hoping to see at least one.

While we gently and relatively quietly motored around the waveless waterways, we saw many varieties of birds, from Bald eagles (including juveniles), to jays, gulls and ravens. Small seals popped their heads out from time to time, and large chum salmon swam beneath our Zodiacs, visible in the clear water.

There are huge conifers in this area, as well as crab-apples and many types of grasses – the combination of salmon and crab-apples is a magnet for bears, grizzlies and black. And although grizzlies seemed to be hard to find, we spotted a black bear cub high up in a crab-apple tree, its mother below. So-o cute – this little black bear grabbing at crab-apples, sliding down and grappling its way back up, the tree shaking with all this activity. We also saw a large male black bear on the shoreline – slowly making its way along the edge, watching us, but not overly concerned by our presence.

Soon it was time to turn around and head back to our floating home. Another delicious dinner from Joshua, followed by our nightly Captain’s Chart Chat by Brian, on where we’ve been and what we’ll be doing tomorrow. This is also the time that our naturalist, Emily, recaps what we’ve seen and “what was special today” - everything!

Tomorrow morning we’ll search here again for grizzlies, before sailing south to Mussel Inlet.