Beluga Blog - July 20, 2006

Headed out on the river today with a couple friends in search of whales. It was a fairly slow day so we only saw 50 or 60 whales but it was still pretty amazing.

Usually there are around 3,000 whales kicking around the river, swimming in and out with the tides. The last few days have been a little quiet (but still awesome), a few locals figure that an Inuit boat might be in town or passed by. Inuit still hunt whales up north and word spreads just as fast among the belugas as it does from the Gypsy Bakery gossip table in Churchill so the whales are a little shy for a few days afterwards.

This afternoon, however, their shyness finally passed. After floating around for a while, we eventually found a family pod of mothers and their young. They were chasing a school of capelin (kind of like a little sardine) across the tide line (where the salt water tide meets the fresh water of the river).
We trolled along beside for maybe 20 minutes before heading back. Most of the time the whales were about 10' from the boat, their scarred back shining in the afternoon sun. I should have some video to post fairly soon. Another good day in Churchill.

Still a lot of bears around, two were hanging out around L5 today and we heard shots behind the Town Centre Complex while we were in town - a sure sign of an unwelcome visitor to town.