When you live to capture the unexpected, then you are rarely let down.

— Ryan Covington

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But okay— not gonna lie— I was a LITTLE let down by my recent whale watching expedition off the coast of Vancouver. 😝

I think this is due in large part to an industry-wide embrace of false advertising by these whale boat tour operators. There is not a company out there that doesn’t have enormous photos of an orca— jumping out of the ocean, like Shamu doing a trick at Sea World— plastered up all over their storefronts, both online and in their windows.

Why do they do this? Or rather, how do they get away with doing this? They are playing with my emotions! Lol 😝

I don’t know the exact statistics, but I have come to learn that the likelihood of a person going out on a half-day whale watching tour and seeing an orca flip itself out of the water right next to the boat is on par with being struck by lightning.

Granted, I’m not a detective, but it didn’t take me long to ferret out that not a single guide at any of these companies had ever gone out and seen that happen. And yet, walking around on Granville Island, you can turn your head in any direction, and this is the photo you are going to see: Orcas doing fantastic tricks in the wild.

As if to say, “Oh, your orca didn’t do that? What a shame— they do this all the time! You must have just missed it…”

It’s very misleading. 😤

Anyways. I do still stand by my original quote, however, because even though a bald eagle was not what we were expecting, nor what we set out to see that day, it was what the Universe decided to provide us with as a consolation prize, and it was riveting, nonetheless.

Was I still kind of hoping that an orca would suddenly jump out of the water and gobble it up??

Well of course! The advertising photos had led me to believe anything was possible out on this boat. 🤣

Wish me better luck in Kenya! Bon Voyage! 😘