Monday Moorings and Mammals

Gary and I slipped out early Monday morning  to take showers.  When we returned, Tosha told us that we had messed up the morning routine.  She said that every morning, Niki would come into their room and tell them good morning and I love you.  However this morning, Niki woke up, noticed that we were gone from our bed and demanded, "Where is Grandpa?"  Gary loved that.  Being grandparents is pretty fun.

The only disadvantage of this campground was that despite being on an island, we couldn't actually see any bodies of water.  That was soon fixed as we spent Monday ON the water for most of the day.

We loaded up after breakfast and headed to our first stop--the Washington State Ferry Pier where we were catching the ferry to Friday, Harbour, San Juan Island.

On the way to the ferry, we finally see water...

These ferries transport vehicles from one island to another.  We were going to drive on as well, but then got some advice that for a one day visit that parking on San Juan would be a huge problem.  We were very glad that we didn't take a car.  If we were going to stay and explore the island, it would have been great but for what we did, walking on was perfect.

Cars first, and then people.....

Niki checking out the brochures.

Tosha and Austen after Gary photo bombed about four other shots....

Lots of water and island views now....

Inside the passenger floor of the ferry----all of the passengers I saw were already "assembled," but if not I am glad they have a spot for it.  (Actually this is the location for gathering in an emergency.)

We enjoyed the views, inside and

outside of the ferry.

Niki

Jena

Cooper

It took about an hour to reach Friday Harbor. We had a few hours until the next leg of our journey began so we headed to the Whale Museum in Friday Harbour and learned about whales....there are some pods of whales who make their home in the Salish Sea which is the area of water between Canada and Washington which connects to the Pacific Ocean on the west and the Puget Sound on the east.  While some whales travel long distances every year, these pods live in the area year around and eat a very restricted diet of a certain type of salmon.  They have not been doing well over the past several years due to dams on streams preventing salmon from returning to traditional laying areas of the rivers ad other reasons.  In fact, the day after we were here, an instagram picture went viral of a whale carrying her newborn baby whale who had died on her nose, keeping it out of the water.  It was a mother whale from one of these pods.

(Whales are very amazing creatures...like elephants which I also love.  Makes sense since they share their love of family and community with me!)

Then went and had some yummy Chinese food.  I am not sure what happened to those pictures on my camera.

After lunch, we checked in for our next boat adventure-- a 3 1/2 to 4 hour whale watching trip!!  You may recall that whale watching was on my famous "Just for Fun Mortal Goals" list and we actually saw lots of whales on a cruise in Hawaii a number of years ago.  It was the first time that I didn't take something off the list, I turned to Gary and said, I want to do this again...and so we did!

Here is our boat--The Odyssey!!

While we waited, we got to see sea planes flying in and out.  That was impressive--might add riding in a sea plane on my bucket list. 

 They had an aquarium to watch while you waited to board the boat.  Niki liked the star fish.

And even here, we were reminded of home.

Across the pier, we saw a familiar flag flying....

The name of the boat was also noteworthy....

SNOW BORED
Salt Lake City, Utah

Some people have a good sense of humor....and lots of money.  And we were off on our next adventure.........

We rode north and then around to the west side of Sun Juan Island.  We actually could see Victoria Island, Canada, to the west of us.  We saw lots of interesting boats (without "U" flags).

We saw other islands with little villages of houses and some with only one or two houses.  On board the ship, the naturalists told us about some of the local lore and a lot about the pods of whales from the area.

The first pictures are taken with a high powered camera by the whale watching group.  Then you will see my photos which are more the reality of what we saw in person.

We did see this bald eagle flying around near the boat for several minutes.

The sea plane as it passed us on the way out of the harbor.

And after almost 3 hours of boating and almost reaching a point where we needed to turn back, they heard that whales were ahead.  The boat speeded up to try to catch a view of this mother with three of her four children.

Here we are near the end of the trip.  Luckily there were other children on the boat which was fun for Niki, especially.  It was a long day for two little boys and they did pretty good.  After all, most of the time, we sat and stared at blue water and islands in the distance.

This is a photo of Mt. Baker which could be seen to the east while we were traveling on the boat.  I had tried to take a few pictures on Sunday night as we drove in, but it blended into the clouds and the darkening skies.

Here are some of my pictures---see that tiny black dot!

There was a ring of boats around the whales and they have to stay a certain distance away from the whales.  All of sudden, our boat went from idling to moving forward quickly and almost immediately two whales popped up close behind us.  Jena and I were sitting on a back lower deck and I was able to get this photo. It was our closest encounter to the whales.  It was amazing in person.

Tosha videoed this:

https://www.facebook.com/tosha.hall.9/videos/10210279918989202/

if the videos work for you, this is 17 seconds of whale watching.  I wasn't sure if Niki really understood about the whole adventure--that those were real whales out there.  However on the ride back, they had a little lecture about whales and showed some models of whales.  Niki held one and told the naturalist that he saw one in the water.  I was so excited.  He got it!! and he loved it!!  (Side note:  Tosha told me a couple of weeks later, they were driving and Niki saw the Puget Sound and said, Mommy, the ocean, where are the whales??"  That made me happy, too.)

The Russells at the end of the whale watching.

Our next ferry back to the cars was delayed by an hour so we had a long wait so we got ICE CREAM!

And watched the seaplanes go in and out of the harbor.

It was another hour ferry ride, then a two hour drive back to the Air Force base, but it was worth it.

That night as we headed to bed in the RV, I told Gary that I would take whale watching off my bucket list...but that didn't mean that I might not slip in another trip or two where we happen to cross paths with whales again---after all, there is Alaska, trips to Oregon coast, and even Mexico where it could happen again with just a bit of planning.

And Monday was in the books!!