Discover Sooke

This past Saturday, Russ from Sooke Coastal Explorations invited Discover Sooke to partake in their bird watching trip to Swiftsure Bank, located about 20 miles from Port Renfrew in the open ocean.

Most people associate Sooke Coastal Explorations as a whale watching expedition company, which they mainly do, however they are available to do guided bird watching trips. If you are interested in guided bird watching trips on the lower Vancouver Island areas, please contact Sooke Coastal Explorations for rates and availability.

We gathered at Sooke Harbour Resort & Marina in the early hours and geared up for a great day on the water. I have to admit, I’ve never been much of a bird person, but I was interested to see the enthusiasm of these gathered bird watchers.

We started off in the middle of the Juan de Fuca strait where we were seeing large groups of sea birds, excuse my lack of knowledge in knowing just what birds we were seeing, but the group was very excited and were having a great time. It took us a couple of hours to get to Swiftsure Bank, but once we got out there, it was a whole different world.

There were birds ALL around us. Thousands and thousands feeding on the bait balls, which in turn brought out many Humpback whales and Sea Lions. To see this much life that far off-shore was amazing. It felt like we were on a different planet.

If I was to speculate just how many Humpback Whales we saw that day, I would say between 30 and 40 would be a safe estimate. As for the variety of birds? I don’t know but the excitement overheard was tremendous. To see this many birds squawking and flying around and all these whales in the background was something else.

We spent a few hours just floating around and taking it all in. Of course watching the fishermen around, bringing up Halibut and Salmon didn’t hurt either.

I had NO idea there was this much sea-life that far off-shore.

It would be safe to say that if you are interested in birds and birdwatching, this would be a spectacular trip for you and a group of you.

For more information please visit Sooke Coastal Explorations website.

Here is a short video of our trip out there, highlighting some of the things we saw and experienced.

For more information on the Sooke area, please visit the official Discover Sooke website.

Filed under: Latest News on September 14th, 2009