Our Vessel
The Island Explorer 3

Introducing the Island Explorer 3, our newest member of the Island Adventures Whale Watching family! We found her down in the whale-rich waters of Hawaii last winter (December 2006) and instantly recognized that this was the perfect boat for whale watching in the Pacific Northwest. The Island Explorer 3 was built in Louisiana in 1994 by Network Marine, Inc. as a whale watching vessel. Her first tour of duty was in the northeast where it was too cold! So she went to Honolulu, Hawaii for 10 years. In December 2006 she joined the Island Adventures’ family and made the long journey to her new home in Washington State. The Island Explorer 3 was in for a treat; her lower deck inner salon was remodeled with yacht-style booth seating, she received a new paint job, and the upper and lower rear deck areas were reformed to allow for even more outside viewing space! The main deck on the Island Explorer 3 is higher than most other whale watching boats and our upper viewing deck will get you an even better viewing opportunity - being high enough off the water is critical now as all vessels must watch the orca whales from 100 yards. This is a new Washington State law that ensures that all private boaters are respectfully viewing wildlife and whales.

The Best Viewing Platform and Comfort for Everyone!

Stats

• Size:101 ft. long, 24 ft. wide
• Weight: 99.2 tons
• Diet: Diesel Fuel
• Engines: Powered by 3 Detroit Diesels, two generators
• Habitat: Waters of the Salish Sea
• Commonly seen: Watching whales
• Range: Can cover over 100 miles in a single whale watching trip; however, capable of traveling from Anacortes to Ketchikan, Alaska without refueling! That’s 750 miles!
• Physical description: Mono-hull, white with blue and red stripes, full walk-around lower viewing deck, large open air upper viewing deck, spacious heated inside salon.

At 101 feet long, with an upper viewing deck and the largest bow-pulpit in the industry, this boat has more than enough space for everyone to have a front row spot at the rails. Both the upper and lower viewing platforms are full walk around decks, which allows effortless movement around the boat. The lower enclosed cabin has four entrance doors making for quick access to the lower outside deck. Her size and stability enables guests to safely move about throughout the trip. The large windows in the lower heated cabin ensure that you won’t miss a thing if you choose to escape from the elements in the comfy new interior, or if you step inside to grab some lunch at our snack bar counter! The Explorer 3 also boasts a 42" flat screen display for slide shows, presentations, videos, whale identification lessons, and for the GPS software that shows our day’s route. Two onboard (clean!) restrooms also add to the comfort of your tour. For our 2010 season, we rebuilt all three engines and added a new exhaust system - the Explorer 3 will run cleaner, and even quieter. We also added more heaters on the upper viewing deck and inside the main cabin - great heat for those cooler northwest days!

Going Green

On board the Island Explorer 3, we use eco-friendly products for cleaning and route all gray water into holding tanks. The cabin floor is black…but it’s really green because it was made from recycled tires. The toilet paper on board is white but it’s green too because we use environmentally friendly T.P. Our crew also installed an oil catchment system in the engine room so there’s never a drop of oil getting into the sea.

Experience The Island Explorer 3 in our 360° panorama gallery