Wildlife View Blog

The next stop of our Newfoundland roadtrip lead us to bonavista, where we stayed, and the bonavista peninsula.

First thing i can recommend is “Trinity Eco Tours” out of Trinity. Trinity is yet another very small village, approx. 1h from bonavista. In difference to St. Shotts it has much more to offer (apart from boat tours). I remember a craft shop, a gift shop, a forge and a nice harbour. There also are good hiking trips nearby – at least they are supposed to be good (didnt do them).

We did a boat tour with Trinity Eco Tours, and chose their 3h morning Trip with a Zodiak boat, which brings me to some Tipps for Boattours:

1. If you can, choose small fast boats like a Zodiak. Its just a better experience for obvious reasons.
2. Check if they have Marine biologists employed. That usually ensures that they are carefull of the animals and abide by the usual rules (200m distance + engine off when they come close + lets the whales decide, if they want to approach).
3. Check for recent sightings in the area.

They mainly focus on whales and also give you lots of Information about them.

Here are our Highlights:

(Unidentified) Shark:

20.07.2024, Google Pixel 6a, Full HD Video, no zoom

Humpbacks:

20.07.2024 Google Pixel 6a, Full HD Video, no zoom

Location: East from Trinity Harbour and then around the corner to the North.

Here is what else you can see around bonavista peninsula (according to Trinity Eco Tours).

Although you will see the occasional shark, what you will mostly see from my experience are the humpbacks. And they are also what you wanna see because of their playfull behaviour:

When they are hunting for fish the dive down deep, which they announce by going pretty much 90degrees downward. Thats when their beautiful tail comes out the water. When they fed enough they get very happy and also sometimes playfull. Then they will slap with their pectoral flippers – some people call that “pectoral slap”. When you are lucky they will even breach through the surface and let themselfs fall down (“breach”) or slap with their Tail.

Additional tipps for whale watching:

1. When you look for recent sightings, it might also be usefull to know, if there are certain seasonal apperarings. What i mean by that ist the following: Usually in the early/mid of July the caplin (main fish source, that humpbacks eat) spawn in the south of newfoundland. Which is why you are supposed to see a lot of humpbacks near St. Vincents at that time. The caplin will go east around newfoundland, which is why you will see a lot of them in the trinity/bonavista area around mid/end of July – depending on the year of course. This should then also apply for St. Johns, which is in between, but i dont kbow for sure. So when we went out on the boat trip on the 20th near bonavista, it was a little early and they were still mainly feeding. Thats why the best pictures i have from then are Tail-pictures like the double Tail above.

So we decided to go with Trinity Eco Tours again, but wait a few days for the whales to feed and get happier.