Whale Watching

Throughout the school year, the school district offers trips for all international students. These trips are not free, but they are cheaper than organizing them privately. One of them was on Friday, September 29th, 2017 and went to Campbell River for Whale Watching. The same trip will be offered again in the second semester, but I wanted to go in this semester so that I could spend some time with a German friend who was flying back home the following day, and because I was hoping for good weather. Unfortunately, that turned out to be unnecessary.

The weather forecasts were initially very good, then eventually turned really bad. Unfortunately, we felt that throughout the entire tour.

I stayed overnight at said friend's place the night before and we drove together to the meeting point the next day. There were a total of 45 international students. We drove for about 50 minutes in a yellow school bus (we go everywhere in them, I somehow feel like they intentionally make us have this stereotypical experience).

When we arrived at the harbor, we had to put on rescue suits, mine was half broken and 5 sizes too big. Then we divided ourselves into the boats, which had room for 11 people. Of course, they were not covered, which you could have expected in the rain.

The tour started and we raced over the sea at 60 km/h, always heading north. We had a destination where we could see whales, until then we only saw occasional sea lions. After 45 minutes we arrived at this destination and took a photo stop. Since it was pouring rain, I didn't want to take out my phone to take photos. The photos you see were all taken by friends.

Then we continued to an island where we made a stop, everyone was already soaked. After hot chocolate that tasted like water, we got back on the boats and started our way back. We made one more stop to see whales, then went back to the harbor as quickly as possible. I don't like to admit it, but because of the lack of sleep last night, I almost fell asleep, but my host father also thinks that the tiredness comes from the fresh sea air and the shaking of the boat.

When we arrived back in Campbell River, everyone was frozen and soaked. Due to the leaky suits, some people (including myself) even looked like they had peed themselves hihi... Not funny. It was still a nice experience and if there are still spots available next semester, maybe I can do it again:)

Quick addition: I got sick