Orca Spirit Adventures Whale Watching

Matt was a great guide and storyteller. We learned a lot about the wild life along the way and the experience is fantastic overall. I really appreciate all the work that goes into protecting the whales. We should all do our part to respect their habitats. The boat gets rocky when it’s shut off so you might feel seasick for a while even on land afterwards.

I see that other reviewers have already spoken highly of the journey itself as well as the professionalism of our guide. These are all true but do not require repeating, so i felt it more useful to report our experiences.

We had an 11 person tour on august 27th 2021, departing at 1300. The vessel was a Zodiac, a repurposed search and rescue ship. It handles well and is quite stable compared to a generic powerboat, with a length of about 9 meters. We returned at 1630. Weather was exceptional for the tour, perhaps occurring once in a couple of months, per Matt, our guide.

The tour started off at the Port Renfrew docks, under foggy condition. This experience itself was quite unique. We then navigated along the coast and headed to the open ocean, where the shallow coastal waters met the open ocean. This place is called "Everest".

Here, we were able to witness a gathering of 10 to 20 humpback whales as they fed and socialized. This included behavious such as breeching, fluke slapping, and pectoral flipper slapping. We also saw 5 curious sea lions, two Californian, three Steller. We then headed back along the van island coast as the fog had cleared up for a spectacular view of the caramah coastline and bonilla point.

One caveat is that when stopped the boat rocks significantly. If you are prone to seasickness you will be seasick. One of our 11 members did have some episodes of vomiting.

Overall this was well worth the money. The tour itself was minimally disruptive to the animals, and contributes towards ecological recordkeeping and other conservation endeavours also. Personally, I would recommend this experience over the Victoria one, as it is more raw and wild. I do not believe any other whale watching tours with the Zodiac class boat accesses the open ocean.

We had our tour with Matt out of Port Renfrew BC this afternoon. He knew his stuff! We saw lots of humpback whales, even a baby! Not only did he bring us to the perfect spot to see whales, he knew all their behavior patterns, he mapped out for us, our surroundings, land marks etc...
We really enjoyed ourselves and will remember our trip with him
Thank you for the experience Matt!!

For anyone looking for an amazing whale watching tour then this is the place! We saw so many beautiful whales but what really made it was the extensive knowledge and informative narrartive our guide, matt gave. We were really lucky to go on a calm day while lots of whales were out and matt actually extended our tour so we could spend more time out on the water with such excellent conditions. 10/10 would go again

The best whale watching tour I’ve ever done. Not because of the whales we saw, but the exceptional professionalism that the guide put into the tour. Matt was amazing, explained things well. Even corrected himself when he thought we saw transient oracs but then realized they were resident orcas.

Was respectful of the animals, kept our distance, didn’t pester, but for amazing views of killer whales and humpbacks! Also, part of the ticket price goes towards marine research so there’s an aspect of social responsibility involved. Amazing company!