It was just an ordinary Tuesday morning for Henry Irizawa.

He was riding the ferry from Nanaimo to Horseshoe Bay – a trip that he says that he has made at least 300 times.

Except this time, he was 40 minutes into the trip when the captain came on the PA system and excitedly told the passengers that there was a pod of dolphins swimming alongside the ship.

Sure enough, Irizawa and a dozen other passengers raced to the ship's deck and were surprised by the sight of what appeared to be 200 Pacific white-sided dolphins speeding through the water.

"I couldn't believe it. It was nothing like I had ever seen. Two hundred dolphins just having so much fun, jumping, racing," Irizawa told CBC. "People around me couldn't speak. It was so exciting."

Irizawa, who is from Comox in British Columbia, Canada, quickly pulled out his phone to record a video of the breath-taking sight.

Since he posted the video to Facebook the following morning, it has been viewed hundreds of thousands of times.

He has also been quick to reassure viewers that the dolphins were swimming alongside the ferry and none of them were struck by the vessel – they were simply content to "escort" it to its destination.

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