Free Whale Watching on Vancouver Island? Head for Victoria's Inner Harbour

"Surfacing," by artist Sandra Bilawich. Photo by Sue Frause.

OK, that headline is a little misleading. Yes, you can go whale watching on Vancouver Island, but it will cost you (one of my favorite operators is the Prince of Whales in Victoria). But there's a different kind of whale watching happening in BC's capital city, and it's on dry land. 

Although I visit Victoria several times a year, this summer was the first time I noticed an eco sculpture on a corner near The Fairmont Empress. Titled Surfacing, it was created in 2010 by artist Sandra Bilawich of Elemental Designs in Vancouver, a joint venture of the City of Victoria and the Downtown Victoria Business Association. It's located at the southeast corner of Humboldt and Government Streets, across from Tourism Victoria's Visitor Centre.

The sculpture features a mother and baby orca in the form of a three-dimensional horticultural display. Unfortunately, I took a picture of the side where the baby orca doesn't show (top photo), but you can see both the mother and baby below. Commonly referred to as The Orcas, it's 14 feet high and 21 feet long. Or in Canuck talk, four metres tall and six metres long.

The garden display of a mother and baby orca riding a wave was inspired by similar three-dimensional garden structures in Burnaby, BC and Montreal's Mosaiculture Garden. The sculpture is re-installed in May every year and is a popular photo op for residents and visitors throughout the summer. In the fall, mom and baby orca return to their Beacon Hill Park nursery to spend the winter in a greenhouse.

Surfacing by Sandra Bilawich. Photo courtesy City of Victoria.

The project started in 2010 with two phases of construction: the design and manufacturing of the frame, and the preparation and planting of it as a three-dimensional garden bed. The frame took five months to build, utilizing steel in a grid-like fashion (the interior is hollow). The planting takes place over two weeks in February at the Beacon Hill Park nursery. That's when the frame is covered with a landscape fabric that's filled with 5.5 cubic metres of soil mixed with sand for drainage. Then 15,000 plants are added, including two varieties of Alternanthera and one variety of Santolina, annuals known for their colorful foliage and low maintenance. To maintain the display, the sculpture is trimmed bi-monthly and receives regular watering. 

Fun Facts About Surfacing (The Orcas)

• Mother orca weighs 3,750 lbs.
• Baby orca weighs 1,050 lbs.
• Mother's dorsal fin weighs 80 lbs.
• Wave and base weigh 6,500 lbs.
• Total display weighs 11,380 lbs.

Visit Quebec's Whale Route in Cote-Nord

One of the biggest surprises for me when I made my first summertime visit to Quebec in 2004 was discovering there were whales in the St. Lawrence River. Really? As often as I had romanticized the St. Lawrence as a child (I often dreamt of someday seeing the river whil coloring it blue on a map), I never imagined it was home to whales. As a west coaster, I'm familiar with whales, as orcas and humpbacks inhabit our waters. My hometown of Langley on Whidbey Island has a Welcome the Whales Festival each spring when the grey whales come to town.

It turns out that the province of Quebec is also home to a number of whales including humpbacks, belugas and minkes. There are also blue whales, the largest known mammal, and fin whales. Whale watching season runs May through October, and the Hotel Tadoussac makes for a good base for the summer activity and other ecotourism outings. If the hotel looks familiar, that's because a number of the outdoor shots for the 1984 film Hotel New Hampshire were shot there. The movie, based on the 1981 John Irving novel of the same name, starred Jodie Foster, Rob Lowe and Beau Bridges.

Hotel Tadoussac opened in 1864 in Tadoussac, Canada's oldest village, which celebrated its 400th anniversary in 2000. It's located 188 km (117 miles) east of Quebec City on the northwest shore of the Saint Lawrence Estuary where it meets the Saguenay River. The combination of the cold, fresh water of the Saguenay and the warmer, salty water of the St. Lawrence makes for a rich marine environment. There is an abundance of krill in the rivers and in summer, the Saguenay Fjord attracts 13 species of whales that use it as their feeding grounds. Hotel Tadoussac is offering a Whale of a Time package through Oct. 8, 2012. Starting at $150CAD, the package includes one night's accommodation, one buffet breakfast and one three-hour whale-watching cruise.

Tadoussac is located in the region of Cote-Nord, which is also home to the Whale Route (Route des baleines), running 900 km (560 miles) along the coast from Tadoussac to Blanc-Sablon. Considered one of the five best whale-watching destinations in the world, it's only fitting that the Marine Mammal Interpretation Centre (CIMM) is in Tadoussac, and is one of ten maritime museums in Quebec. Located near the Tadoussac wharf, it's a good idea to stop by the museum before going out on a whale watching tour. In addition to its large collection of whale skeletons, the museum features interactive exhibits, a garden of indigenous plants and a new workshop on whale songs. You can also see the documentary Meeting With Whales of the St. Lawrence, co-produced with biologist Jean Lemire. 

Photos by Sue Frause