Floating in the wild, trailing orcas and other beasts

Two passed by, followed by a third.

“Sometimes families will travel more spread apart,’’ explained James Pilkington, one of our guides.

“Pffff,’’ we heard from somewhere just offshore. “There’s another one,’’ someone said.

“No, that’s a Dall’s porpoise,’’ said Pilkington. “You can tell by the sound of the blow’’ — a short, small burst of air.

Since it was our first night in this remote setting in southern British Columbia, we had several more days to learn the subtle sounds that distinguish the area’s marine life.

We had signed up for a four-day kayaking adventure on the Johnstone Strait, where we would stay at a wilderness base camp on West Cracroft Island. The camp overlooked a mountainous, undeveloped stretch of Vancouver Island’s east coast, and the adjacent Robson Bight Ecological Preserve, a 2-kilometer-wide, 9-kilometer-long protected marine zone. The preserve harbors big schools of salmon and draws more than 200 killer whales, or orcas, to feed from June to October. From here, we would explore small coves in search of wildlife such as black bears and bald eagles, and, we hoped, see orcas as they cruised along British Columbia’s Inside Passage.

Our group included five solo travelers, two friends, and one couple. Two participants lived on Vancouver Island, but others had come from as far away as England and Australia. We ranged from novice kayakers who sometimes held their paddles upside down to competitive kayakers like Greg Roberts, 44, who had been on extreme paddling trips in some of the most treacherous waters in the world.