A new film about the world's rarest whale

We've been saying we'll be back in Seattle around the first week of October, but after seeing the west coast of Vancouver Island, I think we are all going to stay here forever. Not to mention it might take me that long to get Captain Kevin out of the waves and off his surfboard. We got around the Brooks Peninsula and tucked into Columbia Cove, a place fairly protected by the winds predicted for the next couple days. The last week we've headed offshore, as much as weather perm

We had a hard decision to make a couple days ago. We decided to start heading back down the west side of Vancouver Island, meaning we weren't going to make it to Haida Gwaii. When taking the weather forecasted, our schedule, the miles we still had to travel and the shots we still needed to get, it was clear that traveling up the mainland, crossing Hecate Strait and making landfall somewhere on the south east side of the Queen Charlotte Islands, was not in the best interest fo

The last couple days have allowed us to really get to know Port Hardy and Port McNeil. We’ve been continuing more projects and logistics of the trip to prepare us for the next two weeks. Other than being able to check more things off our never ending to-do list, we met with three of the most interesting people we will probably encounter on this trip. Last winter, in preparation for the film trip, Kevin, T-Rex, Leon and Chester took a trip driving around Vancouver Island and m

We titled our last blog post “Bearly Believeable” because after our incredible wildlife experiences we thought we had seen the magic of Blackfish Sound and Johnstone Strait. However, the last couple of days we have been able to explore places, like the Broughton Islands Archipelago Marine Park, and our journey still isn’t quite believable. We found new peaceful anchorages for our evenings where we watched the moon rise over the beautiful coniferous trees that blanket the shor

These last couple days we have been able to check off a lot of "firsts" for the crew onboard. Not only are all the places we are going unfamiliar and unexplored by Orion herself, but also the crew has been able to add new species and populations to their personal lists of wildlife sightings. As new species show up, we are finally starting to realize how far north we have already come and how much farther we still have to go. Stepping away from the highly populated areas in th

As summer comes to an end, it's about the time people start migrating closer to the equator to escape the winter. But everyday on Orion, we keep heading north. We have traveled many miles passing and waving to the parade of fishing vessels heading back from a summer in Alaska. We are seeing less and less personal boats on the water with September just around the corner. Though we know our northern route will have us in layers before we know it, we have spent the last three da