Orca watching

Ok, I have to apologize, I have a pile of photos, and things to write about, but no time to write or organize. Isn’t that always the way. Last week, August 3-10, my friend Chris stayed with me and I took the week off work. It was a week of much photography, as Chris is even more into photography than I am. I also found out he is a bad influence, but more on that later.

I have had a photo set up on Flickr for a while now entitled BC Day which shows our first day out, Aug 4 or BC Day here in this province. That day started off with me buying a new lens, the Canon 50mm f/1.8, which while cheap, takes a very crisp photo. Then we headed down to Granville Island where we enjoyed the holiday festivities and took lots of photos along the way. After wandering around in the heat, we eventually headed back downtown via a walk across the Granville Street bridge.

The next day we decided we were going to try and head out whale watching. It was something that Chris had mentioned looking into and so we hit the Internet and found a few places who offered tours from the Vancouver area. We weighed the pros and cons, and eventually settled on Steveston Seabreeze Adventures. We called them up and they had some spots available on their afternoon excursion. They offered a shuttle service as well and told us they could pick us up at a nearby hotel. With the tour organized, there was only one thing left to do to prepare: rent a really big lens. At least Chris did. I felt happy with my 300mm, but Chris wanted to up the ante to 400mm, in a nice L-series lens. Although heavy, this was a nice lens. It did the trick too, because his photos were far better than mine. His camera is nicer as well, and I had mistakenly set my auto-focus to a setting that wasn’t very useful. However, I did manage to snag a few decent shots all things considered. I have an appropriately named Orca Watching photoset on Flickr with the results. I might toss up a couple of Chris’s photos at some point too–with proper accreditation.

It was a great trip out, the day was beautiful and the whales were active. Although expensive, the excursion was well worth it in both of our minds. The folks at Steveston Seabreeze Adventures were kind and easy to deal with. A very pleasant experience.

All told, the whole thing lasted about six hours and when we got back we were pretty exhausted. Being out in the sun all these days was starting to take its toll on both of us. However, the week was just getting started. There are many more photos and stories to relate. I also added a new page which outlines some of the photo gear I’ve acquired, most of it quite recently. More posts and photos to follow, hopefully soon.