Oldies but Goodies

June 9, 2013

Today was the day for glaciers. We went on the Kenai Fjords National Park tour. We left the dock at 10 a.m. and arrived back at 6:30 p.m. We saw several humpback whales, lots of orcas (which we learned are not really whales but the largest porpoise) sea lions, bald eagles, dall porpoises and a horned puffin. The wildlife was really cool, especially the whales, however, the highlight of the tour was the Aialik Glacier. To get to the glacier the captain had to guide the boat through an ice field but she managed to get us within a 1/2 mile of the glacier. We got to see the glacier calving today. Calving is when the glacier moves and parts of it fall into the water. When this happens it sometimes sounds like a gunshot but most of the time sounds like a really loud clap of thunder. We saw several really big chunks fall and heard lots of the thunder sound. The thunder sound doesn't happen until after the ice has fallen so you have to be a little lucky to see. Another one cool thing about a glacier is the blue color you can see in the ice. The captain informed us that it is blue because all the air is pushed out of the ice so all you see is the blue of the ice. We took a lot of pictures today but a lot of them are not very good as it was hard to catch stuff on camera.

Towards the end of the cruise we stopped at Fox Island (a private beach for the tour company) where we had a great buffet. All the salmon and prime rib you could eat. The prime rib was really good - I wasn't a big fan of the salmon. After we got back we decided to take a short drive to Exit glacier where you can hike up really close. It is about a 2 mile hike but you can see the glacier really well. This one does not calve but it is suppose to groan and moan although we didn't hear any of that. We are now back at our campsite and really tired. We are thinking about staying in Seward (at a different campground) one more night before we move on south to the Homer area.

Here are some of the better pictures.