Week 1-Check!

I have finished my first week here at The Center for Whale Research. It's been both eventful and restful at once. I have fully recovered from the long ordeal of my travel and am settled into the pace of life here. I have done a lot of chores helping to get the place ready for the busy time which is when the K-Pod and the L-Pod arrive for the summer. They should be arriving any day now. Each day we wait in anticipation as the whales get identified to see if they are K or L, so far they have always been the J-Pod. While we wait, we do chores around the property. The Center needs the most photo identification on the K-Pod and the L-Pods. When they arrive, the staff will start going out in the boat more frequently to photo.

I am enjoying serving in anyway that I can which so far has primarily been in doing chores, cooking, cleaning and helping enter data in the database. For the database, there is a need to enter data from logs for years prior to 1995. I have very much enjoyed learning about the work that is done here and look forward to being able to help more as I become more familiar with the work.

I heard whales last night from my tent which still completely blows my mind!!! (Pun fully intended.) I awoke in the middle of the night for the first time since I've been here and immediately heard a blow. I heard two more and then drifted back to sleep. Today I saw around 7 of the J-Pod orcas swim in a tight formation right by the Center. It was amazing to watch and see them all blow and surface one after the other. (We can't hear them blow from the deck of the center, only from the top of the hill on the property) This was my first time this trip seeing a tight formation swim. It's breathtaking.

The hydrophone is always on in the living room and it's a joy to keep an ear tuned to it. So far, I've only heard them on there once. The hydrophone is about a half mile away from the Center.

Yesterday was definitely the highlight of my trip, as I got to spend the day with Ken Balcomb who is the Executive Director of the Center here as well as a world famous expert on marine mammals, particularly orca. He had a former colleague staying for a day and took both of us around the island to view the whales. He planned on taking us out in the boat, however, the whales turned around making land viewing a better option.

His friend is Marisa who served with him on the Regina Maris while they were researching whales in Greenland a couple of decades ago. I so enjoyed hearing their stories about their summer so many years ago in Greenland. Everyone else went to town, so it was just the three of us which made for a superb atmosphere. I savored every single minute of time with both of them. Marisa is now a veterinarian in San Diego.

Ken told me about when the identification project was just beginning. There were and remain clearly divided sides: 1. Pro-orca and 2. Pro-marine parks. He told me of arrests made on him at the time while he was getting an accurate population count on the Southern Resident Killer Whales (SRKW), him fighting in Washington and winning. He even showed me Kanaka Bay which is a sight that the whales were penned in during capture until they could be transported to a marine park.

It was a humbling experience. I'm so grateful for the work he and so many others have done for the preservation of the SRKW. I've so enjoyed learning stories, matriarch lines and history on the J-Pod whales. Yesterday I made a positive identification on J-1 which was an exhilarating feeling!!!

I have a treat tomorrow, one of my friends is coming to visit me in Friday Harbour. I will be meeting Kari at the ferry terminal in the morning and we are staying at a hotel in town. I'm really looking forward to seeing a familiar face.

Until next time, here are the weeks photos (all taken from shore). No need to readjust your screen, it really is that gray here. I love the change of colors and how everything looks so very different hour to hour:
June 6 (Harbor Seals)
June 7 (Sunset)
June 8 (spending the day with Ken, Kanak Bay, whales near shore, new baby J-42)
June 9 (whales swimming in close formation)