An amazing visit to Farewell Harbour Lodge on the Broughton Archipelago with so many sightings of whales, grizzly bears and other wildlife.
More Canada
The second day at Farewell Harbour Lodge our little group collectively decided we couldn't improve on our bear sighting and decided to try our luck finding orcas. We set off after breakfast with James as our pilot and we were quite a long way out from Farewell Harbour when the boat just stopped. No power in the engine and the gears grinding when James tried to restart.
We were in a 1m swell and parallel to it - with no control the boat rolled alarmingly at times. James radioed for help and within ten minutes Daryl arrived but it was impossible to get the boats stabilised next to each other in the swell. Then Tim arrived with a strong rope and they managed to tie us to Tim's boat. As soon as our boat was tied perpendicular to the swell it was much calmer. We then all, bar James, moved onto Daryl's boat. Tim towed James to the nearest dock and we were taken back to Farewell Harbour. Rather an exciting start to the day!
Orcas had been spotted not far from Alder Bay so it was decided we would go with the boat transferring those leaving today and we would be picked up in Alder Bay to continue our search.
In Alder Bay the most amazing sight: a humpback whale, a distance from the boat, was porpoising, 7 or 8 times that we saw, one after the other. Half way through the sequence he jumped right out of the water and flipped onto his back, absolutely incredible. I was so entranced I didn't even think of taking a photograph.
James came for us at Alder Bay and we were off again to hunt orcas.
Soon we spotted one male with two females, beautiful to see. The dorsal fin of the male is much taller and not so swept back.
These are Bigg's orcas, the transient killer whales, as opposed to the resident killer whales. There were sea lions here too which we thought the whales were hunting.
We followed the orcas quite a long way out into the bay before turning around as they headed into the distance.
We also saw lots of curious sea otters and quite a few humpbacks including one very close to the boat.
It was getting quite dark by this time so photographs weren't great.
Back at the lodge we had another excellent dinner: cream of mushroom soup, sour dough tomato pesto crostinis, spring rolls with peanut and sweet chili sauces, scallop and prawn ceviche, grapefruit salad, duck breast with blueberry jus served with roast potatoes and beetroot and rosemary honey. Made space for an equally excellent dessert: chocolate nut bark with raspberry sorbet.
Each evening one of the guides gave a talk in the lounge on some aspect of the wildlife in the area; they were a perfect way to round off the day.
On our final day, after breakfast, we set off in the boat with Elly as our guide to one of the First Nations villages,Tsatsinukwomi. Elly, a Farewell Harbour employee, is a family member of the village, and her cousin was our guide around the village. She was very good and gave us a lot of very interesting information about the history of the village and its people.
The village had been abandoned when the government threatened to (and did) take away the children. Even siblings were split up and sent to different residential schools. This seems to have been part of a deliberate attempt by the government to destroy the First Nations culture. Many families left to be as close to their children as possible.
Elly's grandfather missed his village very much and eventually returned to try to restore it. He began to rebuild a house for himself and his wife and other buildings, including the ceremonial Big House. It was a real privilege to be shown around the village and particularly the Big House, which is so much a part of the culture and traditions of the people.
The Big House has a fire pit and long benches to accommodate families from other First Nations communities in the region who come to witness special events such as an inauguration of a new chief and weddings.. There are many beautiful carved and painted masks and totems, and traditional hand made button blankets. No photography was allowed in the Big House.
After the visit we returned to Farewell Harbour for snacks and drinks before our transfer to Alder Bay.
The waters had a final amazing display for us. A humpback was vigorously tail-slapping the surface of the water and rolling, not just once but many, many times, an incredible sight.
He turned and headed deeper into the bay from where we'd come and was still tail-slapping as we began the engines again and headed for Alder Bay. It was a spectacular end to our time at Farewell Harbour Lodge.
As there were a few hours before our flight to Vancouver, we were taken to Telegraph Cove on Vancouver Island.
Telegraph Cove is a small coastal village, the site of the original telegraph station for northern Vancouver Island built in 1911.
It was quiet when we were there and we didn't do much more than have a good lunch at the Blue Whale restaurant and a look around the Whale Interpretation Centre before our transfer to the airport.