onto Quadra Island

I looked at the map and thought Quadra might offer opportunities for seeing seabirds close as I had seen large numbers of Marbler Murrelets and Rhinoceros Auklets off there in June but it was a bit of mistake giving it 3 nights as the habitats were pretty limited and 2 and half days of rain did not help -- on the plus side we had a Humpback Whale offshore on two days; saw it breach twice but missed both with the camera but on the second calm morning heard a massive bang and realised that it had breached again then after that the exhaling noise was clearly audible even though it must have been about 1.5kms away -- en route we stopped off at Miracle Beach PP just as the heavy rain set in for the day but Julia found this Red-breasted Sapsucker doing what they d0 - in fact she found all of the Red-breasted Sapsuckers we saw which is a bit worrying

On the short ferry crossing to Quadra I hoped to get some flying auks so stood outside in the heavy rain but nothing much passed the boat and I ended up with a few specs -- but what would you ID one of these as on a Lincolnshire seawatch?  -upper 4 images Rhinoceros Auklets and the bottom two Cassin's Auklet another new bird for me - pity I didn't see them better! - this non breeding Pacific Diver with a juv Red-necked Grebe was the closest bird I saw there and again in heavy rain --