Whale Watching Week

December 26th, 2010 - January 1st, 2011

Photo courtesy of Depoe Bay Whale Watching Center

Gray whales migrate South from their feeding grounds in the Bering and Chukchi seas around Alaska beginning mid-December through January. They are heading to their breeding grounds in Baja California, Mexico, where warm-water lagoons become nurseries for expectant mothers. Then from March to June the whales migrate North back to Alaska. On each trip, approximately 18,000 gray whales pass close to the Oregon Coast. Thanks to towering coastal bluffs and a string of beaches set aside as state parks, Oregon offers visitors front-row seats for whale watching.