SRKWs at Point Robinson — PNW Orca Pod Squad Photography

I was packed and ready to go at the first notification of a whale sighting in Central Puget Sound. There had been vague reports of orca vocalizations heard on the Bush Point hydrophone at 01:30 and 06:30 on Friday morning, so we thought the residents had headed back out west through Admiralty Inlet. Not really sure what to do, I loaded the car and headed north towards Edmonds with a plan to head over to Kingston. Don’t worry, Dudley was tagging along for this adventure, too. My friend, Ariel, was stationed at Marina Beach Park in Edmonds scanning for any sign of the whales. I had purchased a ferry ticket, was in Lane 4 in Edmonds when my phone rang. It was Ariel, “Did you see the recent report? Orcas off Dilworth, heading southbound?” For those of you not familiar with the area, Dilworth is on the east side of Vashon Island, roughly 35 miles from Edmonds and it was 09:18. You know what that means, morning rush hour. With no cars in Lane 5, I maneuvered my car out of the Edmonds ferry lane and headed south towards Vashon Island with Ariel hot on my heals.

Like the wind, I barely made the Vashon ferry's 10:10 scheduled departure, but I was on my way. With binoculars in one hand and camera in the other, I easily stood out on the ferry as someone on lookout. A WSF employee approached me, '“We saw whales a while ago, about a mile off shore, maybe two.” Just my luck. The ferry docked and I was headed south. First stop, Maury Island Marine Park overlook to scout for whales. Distant blows and dorsal could be seen just north of Browns Point Lighthouse, but too far out to ID. Additional reports were trickling in via the Orca Network Facebook page about additional small groups of killer whales passing Maury Island Marine Park and Golds Beach southbound towards Browns Point and Commencement Bay.

I headed down to Point Robinson Lighthouse to see what I could find. I was the only one down on the beach, which was my first indication that most of the whales had already passed. My dog, Dudley, was running through the sand and surf, tossing driftwood at my feet as I scanned the waterway north towards Three Tree Point/Alki and south towards Browns Point. No blows or dorsal fins. Ariel had left Edmonds and headed down to meet me for her first experience of a close pass of killer whales from shore at Point Robinson in daylight. We were prepared for a long wait. We settled into our camp chairs, plugged our cell phones into portable chargers, checked and double checked to make sure our camera equipment was working, and repeatedly refreshed the Orca Network Facebook page for new updates. At 12:19 pm the latest update was posted “Puget Sound Orcas - this is the NORTHERN GROUP (presumably Southern Residents): Noon - large pod southbound south of Yeomalt, Bainbridge Island with others following.” There were now three separate groups of orcas throughout central and south Puget Sound, so the reports were getting confusing. Ariel and I looked at each other, “this sounds more like residents” we both said in unison. Now the wait was on.

Hour one, turned into a second and then a third hour. Instead of counting just the hours, we started counting the number of rain squalls that had passed. The reports were few and far between. Intermittently people would show up at the point, but with the wind and rain they would never stay. At this point we were both completely soaked and couldn’t really feel our toes, but we were determined to stay until it was completely dark. A woman and her son had shown up and told us their family member had just been on the Fauntleroy-Vashon ferry and that the ferry had to stop to let the whales pass. Then another report came in “4:08 pm lead whales nearing Three Tree Point and trailers just passing Dilworth on Vashon. —Amy”. We knew they were headed our way, but the question was would they reach Point Robinson before nightfall? It felt like an eternity until we sighted our first blow off in the distance. They were still travelling southbound, albeit taking their time, seemingly not in any rush. And then it happened.

“Kawoof” or “Ppoooffff“, I guess it doesn’t really matter how you phonetically spell the sound of a killer whale exhaling. What is important is that it’s the most magical sound to hear after sitting in the wind and rain for more than 6.5 hours, through 6 rain squalls waiting for the whales and they finally arrived. As the first whales passed we knew from seeing open saddle patches that these were our beloved Southern Resident killer whales (SRKWs). The excitement at Point Robinson was palpable. Residents of the island and off-islanders were crowding the beach, neighbors and strangers rubbing elbows, old whale friends meeting up again all for the singular purpose of getting to spend some time with our SRKWs. Point Robinson is a special place for many as this is our version of the west side of San Juan Island where the whales will make close passes along the shore. This particular day presented one challenge: a few young seals were in the area and weren’t quite sure if these were friendly fish-eating resident orcas or not-so-friendly mammal eating Bigg’s killer whales. Although we knew these seals were safe, we were happy to share our small stretch of beach and provide a little shelter from the oncoming killer whales. As the whales continued to pass we began to recognize individuals: K20 Spock made an appearance (confirming the presence of at least some K-pod whales), but then there was L55 Nugget with L118 Jade and L123 Lazuli. Hmm, that meant we had at least some K-pod and some L-pod whales. And then it happened, J27 Blackberry surfaced with J31 Tsuchi (J56 Tofino reportedly tucked in between her mother and her uncle) and J49 T’ilem I’nges. The tears began to fall as I made the realization that for the second time in under 2 months I was experiencing one of the largest gatherings of Southern Resident killer whales with members of all three pods present and it was occurring in Central Puget Sound. I was “orca struck”. There were people cheering, high-fiveing friends and strangers. Ariel’s and my patience has paid off in the most spectacular way. As quickly as they had arrived at Point Robinson, they disappeared into a dense fog bank and were gone.

J27 Blackberrym J31 Tsuchi, J49 T'ilem I'nges

Of all the stories from that day just one week ago, this one sticks with me the most. Ariel said to me, as we walked back to our cars, “There are three whales that I always try to see every year: J27 Blackberry, K26 Lobo, and L82 Kasatka but it usually doesn’t happen. But today I saw all three in under 5 minutes.” These are the memories from whale watching that will stick with us forever and give us the strength to keep fighting everyday to make their home a cleaner, quieter and safer place for current and future generations of Southern Resident killer whales.