Glacier Bay National Park

In the morning (3:30 am to be exact), the skies were already streaked with pink as daybreak approached (though I’m not exactly sure what defines terms like “daybreak”, “sunrise” and “sunset” when clearly I’ve not yet seen a time without the sun in the sky somewhere!) and when we tried to do our morning walk we were met with more than 50 people, including the naturalist, already up on the promenade deck searching for whales. We were not disappointed - “thar she blows!” was heard again and again as we discovered a pod of 7-8 humpback whales.

As it turned out the Helmers were up early as well (though not 5 am early like us!) and we went up and got some breakfast before returning to our cabins. Our port side decks proved to be the perfect viewing spot for the morning cruise through Glacier Bay and we spotted Orca whales (an extremely unusual sight as they don’t generally venture into the Park and never for very long when they do). It was a bit chilly but we all bundled up and spent the entire morning on our deck watching this amazing panorama pass by us. We saw some more wildlife (sea otters and puffins and lots and lots of sea gulls). The large glaciers were all on the port side in the morning and stunning, given the pleasant temperature and brilliant skies. We even watched (and I think more impressively heard) the glacial calving several times over.

This was the crowning glory of the day - the Margarie Glacier. The glacier you see in the foreground is over 250 ft. high (and extends another 100 ft. below the bay). Those mountains in the background are over 15,000 ft. high, each one of them higher than Rainier!

~later, tw