Canada day 16: Wildlife safari Campbell river!

We got a really nice breakfast in the B&B. We can highly recommend it. Today we are going to do a Wildlife safari from Campbell river with Eagle eye adventures. This is the main reason why I upgraded my Sony RX10M3 for a Sony RX10M4. This ne camera has the same lens, but has phase focusing, which really improves the speed and quality of the focussing. Next to that it can burst to 24 fps (at fullresolution) and maintain it for more than 200 photographs. Only downside of that is that the SD card fills up rather quickly (you can lower fps if you want).

In contrast to yesterday night we are going with the car to the harbor. Officially you are only allowed to park there for a few hours, but we decided to park there anyway. After checking with Eagle eye adventures and they said this sort of tolerated as long as you are not in a 30 min spot. Today they are going with two boats. We already saw them in the harbor yesterday. The boats can reach 60-70 km/h (37-43 miles per hour), hence ideal to see a lot. Each boat can fit maximum 11 people, 2 in the front row and 3 in the other rows. Our boat was not really full. We got a really thick suit which is to keep us warm and at the same time a floatation device. We also got a hat tand gloves. All of this because due to the speed of the boats it can get cold. Both boats leave almost at the same time, the other boat::

The safari started well, within 5 mins we saw the first humpback whale:

A small plane also came overhead, probably they were doing an airplane safari:
I guess that is a fun thing to do some time as well, but likely this is rather expensive… Maybe better to rent a plane and fly myself.

Fifteen minutes later we saw more humpbacks, two together:

Then another one. I made a movie from a series of 109 fotographs at 24 fps:

Saw a seal:

Bald eagle:

Black bear:

He is foraging at low tide. Another photo:

Photograph of the scenery

Then we stopped at a bald eagle nest

We thought there was nothing to see (at least we could not with the nakes eye), but after zooming in on the photograph you could see a young bald eagle:

At certain locations there is some fog over the water:

Sea lions:

Then we stopped for lunch and to have a restroom break. We only made it a short stopto be able to see as much as possible today. After lunch we went first to a special point in the area (N50.397339, W125.165133). There is a very strong current here at certain times of the day due to the tides. Due to this strong current fish are being pushed to the surface of the water. The fish lie there helpless on the surface of the water and literally more than 100 bard eagles are waiting to eat them. A true spectacle! The bald eagles just grab the fish from teh water. In the end I shopt 916 photgraphs! A selection of the best photographs:

Er zwom ook een zeehond rond om wat vis mee te pakken:

Little bit digitally further zoomed in:

I made a video from a series of photographs. This one shows a adolescent bald eagle that plucks a fish from the water:

Here a photograph of all the eagles in the trees waiting (unfortunately its rather a bad photograph, too much light from the back and not completely sharp):

After the fish was more or less finished we sailed onwards, came across some seals:

More humpbacks:

Dolohins:

Two humpback that were hitting the water with their fins:

Then we saw some jumping humpback:

Another one tail fin up close:

And finally one humpback was interrested in our boat and approached it

Normally we are not allowed to go close to the whales, but it is ok if they humpback comes to us.

Super closeup of the back fin:

It also went under the boat:

It waved one more time before it left:

In the end it did about three laps around the boat and went once under the boat. Really special to see such a big animal from that close, something like 1.5 m at the closest point, almost close enough to touch!

It was getting late (16:30) and we had to go back to Campbell river.

Almost at the same time we got back the other boat also entered the harbor:

This is the route we took:

The was a really good whale/wildlife safari. A lot better than the one in Iceland, and also better than the one in South Africa we did.

We had diner at Dick’s fish and Chips. We were lucky as the fish was almost sold out. We almost had the last pieces. While they were preparing our food a number of customers had to be disappoined by the staff. The food itself was pretty good, but do not expect a restaurant experience.