Whale watching Seattle/Victoria
 

Our family is planning a vacation this summer (Aug 4-12) to Seattle and among the "must sees" we've been told to do is whale watching on Victoria Island. We're thinking of staying there for 2 nights. Any suggestions on the best transportation to Victoria from Seattle, accommodations in Victoria and best timing for whale watching? I'd love to hear any other thoughts on attractions or excursions for families (kids are 9 &13). Thanks.

Just for clarification - it's Vancouver Island. The city is Victoria.
There's a thread on the Canada forum that I just topped for you, re whale watching out of Victoria. It's headed "Vancouver Island itinerary" or something like that. It would seem that there are better places on the island for whale watching rather than Victoria itself.
We took the ferry from Anacortes to Sidney (just north of Victoria) a couple of years ago - great trip - and we actually saw a pod of orcas from the ferry. They hung around for a good 45 minutes - an unscheduled whale watching opportunity!

I highly recommend the San Juan Islands for whale watching. The island chain lies between the mainland and Vancouver Island. We stayed a week in a nice cabin last year and had an Orca pod right off shore and following along with the ferry. A family member also went whale watching at Tofino on Vancouver Island. That trip was in a Zodiac and they had a very close and wonderful encounter (although I'm a bit opposed to very close whale watching myself). You can't miss with location, but timing is critical and you may find early August to be a bit late

If August is too late then is May too early for whale watching?

Is early August too late in general for whale watching or just for specific areas, such as the trip in the Zodiac that Sgorces mentioned?

Early August is still considered prime season for spying Orca pods in the San Juan Islands. We have gone out with Mosquito Fleet (http://www.whalewatching.com/whale_w...se_details.htm), and had a wonderful time, watching the scenery and spotting Orcas.

There are several operators out of Tofino, many of whom use small boats to go out onto Clayoquot Sound. We last went out with The Whale Centre (http://www.island.net/~whales/whalewatching.htm).

It is a several hours' drive from Victoria to Tofino, so you would want to stay overnight in Tofino. Certainly possible if you intend to visit Victoria anyway, but I wouldn't go all that way just for whale watching.

To get to Victoria, you can take the Victoria Clipper passenger-only ferry (http://www.victoriaclipper.com/marketing/homepage.shtml) from Seattle, or take a car ferry from Anacortes (through the San Juan Islands - http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/ferries/sche...route=ana-sjwd), or a car ferry from Tsawwassen (just south of Vancouver - http://www.bcferries.com/schedules/mainland/index.html). Lastly, you can go by float plane from Seattle's Lake Union, on Kenmore Air (http://www.kenmoreair.com/).

One other thing to consider is a trip up to Vancouver, seeing some sites, ferrying over to Victoria, then ferrying back to the mainland. Vancouver is a great city, with tons of fun things to do, like the Capilano Suspension Bridge, Stanley Park and Aquarium, and Grouse Mountain Tram.

Some fun family things to do: Take a boat tour, with dinner and a Northwest Coast Indian performance at Tillicum Village. Drive up to Snoqualmie Falls. Visit the Seattle waterfront, trolley, Pike Place Market, and Aquarium. Visit Seattle Center, including the monorail, amusement park, Space Needle, and Pacific Science Center. Take a tour of 'Underground Seattle', where parts of the older now-buried original city remain. Visit the Museum of Flight. Visit the Boeing airplane factory in Everett, although your 9-yr-old may be too young. Rent kayaks and paddle around on Lake Union.

I want to come down on the side of sgorces like a ton of muktuk: please ensure that any tour operator you use is a member of the Whale Watchers Operators Association NW and subscribes to their "best practices." See http://www.nwwhalewatchers.org/guidelines.html

"Loving them to death" is becoming a real risk with orcas - evidence Keiko, Springer, and other animals whose encounters with tourists and humans have turned out poorly. They are wild animals, living around noisy tour boats, tankers, submarines and antisubmarine warfare installations (big controversy currently over Navy sonar testing killing or injuring marine mammals); so enjoy the view but please don't become part of the problem. You wouldn't go on a wildlife tour in Africa and get between a stalking lion and a gazelle, would you?

We booked a whale watching cruise that had a naturalist on board out of Friday's Harbor. They were very careful not to get close to the whales but we really did not see anything from the boat. We saw many more whales in the late morning from the park at the Southwest corner of the island in the late morning. We were told that they follow the fishing boats. The whales put on quite a show for us while we sat on the cliff at the side of the road. I think the park was named Limekiln. Perhaps we got lucky but I recall that the map said it was the whale watching park.