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BELLINGHAM, WA (MyBellinghamNow.com) – Whale watching is a popular pastime in the Pacific Northwest, drawing tourists from around the world to the coast and islands in the Salish Sea. The opportunity to see one of the large mammals in their natural habitat in addition to other wildlife in the picturesque emerald islands is not something to pass up easily.
Drew Schmidt, owner of San Juan Cruises, has been with the company since it began operation in the mid-1980s. He said he likes to be out on the open water and that interest carried on from his youth learning to sail in the Seattle area.
“You know, I was a Sea Scout as a kid and just got hooked on the water and never got smart enough doing anything else,” Schmidt said.
While it is their most popular excursion, whale watching is only one part of the San Juan Cruises operation. The company operates eleven cruises that work out of Bellingham and an expansion to La Conner. They offer crab dinner cruises, beer and wine cruises, private parties and picnic lunches at Sucia Island and Friday Harbor.
In addition to it being a family business, Schmidt also employs a lot of college students in Bellingham as San Juan Cruises operates primarily in the spring and summer months. One of those employees named Emily Lekberg stayed on after graduation in 2024, taking over as a naturalist for their whale watching tours.
“I was looking forward to having a summer job in Bellingham, and I wanted to be outside, and I saw an ad for this job. I actually started as a deck hand here, and so I was a deck hand for two seasons,” she said. “I thought it was perfect, because I was in the Marine Biology [department] and this is a whale watching boat, so I got to be around like my favorite thing all the time.”
“I feel like we’re basically advocates for the whales, and we get to educate people on their life history and [what’s] impacting those whales, and how we can help getting people out and seeing them really makes them think about their impact on marine life too.” – Emily Lekberg
The boats go out daily for roughly six hours, traveling anywhere in the Salish Sea that can be reached in that timeframe. The route varies day-to-day, and according to one of San Juan Cruises’ captains, it depends on the weather and the Pacific Whale Watch Association (PWWA).
San Juan Cruises is one of thirty members of the PWWA, which encompasses whale watching companies in the state of Washington and Vancouver B.C. Members will communicate via radio with each other about their location and what they have seen. The overall goal is to provide a community conversation in order to find whales and observe them safely.
“I feel like when people think about whale watching, they think of whale watchers taking advantage of the whales, but there’s lots of distances and guidelines that we follow,” Lekberg said. “So, for orcas, we stay 200 yards away from them, and then we do parallel viewing. And those regulations are pretty important to us, and we want to be respectful of everyone and any animal.”
Species that may be seen on the tour are humpback whales, Biggs orcas, grey whales, Minke whales, harbor porpoises and Southern Resident orcas. Other animals than whales show up when you’re on the water including sea lions and harbor seals. When My Bellingham Now went on a tour on July 24, no whales were spotted, which Lekberg said is highly unusual.
“People are definitely sometimes disappointed. And that’s fair, you know. But I think most people understand that this is wildlife in the wild, and we can’t make whales appear out of nowhere,” she said. “I feel, for the most part, most people are pretty content with what we see. And even when we don’t see any whales, it’s a nice day out on the water, and sometimes we see pinnipeds and harbor seals too. Most people are pretty nice about it.”
Whale watching is as much about conservation and education as it is about enjoyment. Every sighting is documented and uploaded to a database to be used by researchers at a later date. Throughout the tour Lekberg speaks into a PA system, reciting facts about marine life.
“It’s a great way to see the whales when they’re not in captivity and seeing them in the wild and in their home where they’re supposed to be,” Lekberg said. “I feel like we’re basically advocates for the whales, and we get to educate people on their life history and [what’s] impacting those whales, and how we can help getting people out and seeing them really makes them think about their impact on marine life too.”
The naturalist station on the boat offers people the opportunity to see bones, baleen and teeth that belong to various marine mammal species that are largely native to the Pacific Northwest. A collection of picture books nearby gives people the opportunity to learn facts about marine life and seafaring.
“A lot [of it] is the–I want to call it joy–that people get out of being on the water and you get to show people things that they’ve never experienced before. We have so many folks that come from Texas and Nebraska and even just everybody from around here. You don’t necessarily get on the water and get to see a whale breaching or making a big scene,” Schmidt said.
For Schmidt, he enjoys the idea that each day sailing with San Juan Cruises is different and is able to provide unique experiences for each group of people.
“My favorite thing about being on the water is that it’s different every single day. You know, you look out there right now and it’s flat, calm and beautiful, and sun’s out, boats getting underway with 110 people on it that are excited to go see what they’re gonna see. Some days it’s windy or rainy, and I like it all,” Schmidt said.
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