Water and Ice

We spent the night anchored at the foot of Reid Glacier.

We got to Margerie Glacier early, so as to kayak without any cruise boats' wake. The day was sunny and warm again, so I was in a tee shirt and spent a little time sunning myself in the back of the kayak while Deb paddled (don't tell her, though). The Margerie glacier and the Grand Pacific merge together and create a contrasting sight. Margerie is white and blue, with a lot of dirt mostly on one side. On the other hand, the Grand Pacific looks like a big dirt mound, winding its way down the valley to the sea. The Grand Pacific was the glacier that was responsible for carving out the national park. In the late 1700's, Grand Pacific reached the Icy Strait, which is now the gateway to the park and near Gustavus; however, it has retreated 65 miles to its current position. At some point in the 1920's it retreated all the way into Canada, but it now sits on the US side of the border. There was, of course, an argument over whose glacier it was, and the international body that governs these things (can't remember the name) awarded its possession to the US. But I digress, we got to watch the glacier calf several pieces of ice, as well as row by a number of bird species. I took a lot of pictures of puffins, but I can't tell if they've come out or not. Between their bobbing and the kayak rocking, it was a difficult scene to shoot. Unfortunately, the wind picked up, blowing cold air from the ice, and the water got rough. We had to pay close attention, so as not to drift into the icebergs floating all around us. We got to see the glacier calve a couple of times, but what is so amazing is the booming noises, which echo down the valley, from the internal glacial movement. As the currents grew stronger with the incoming tide, Kimber decided to point us back to the boat. It was a little work to get back. There was a lot of ice to detour, as well as currents. I had to ask Deb to stop paddling at one point, because every time she raised her oar, the spray came off and hit me in the face. The water was extremely cold, but that wasn't as annoying as having to clean my glasses every few minutes, while trying to keep my camera dry, while trying to paddle, while trying to navigate through the ice chunks. It was fun, though.

We pulled anchor and headed for John Hopkins glacier. It was only opened for boat traffic last week (7/1). It is a protected area because of the seal pups. We decided to go check it out. It was beautiful in the inlet. The water was chocked with icebergs from the calving glacier. Seals lounged on the bergs, in some areas, but the boat stayed quite a distance from them. The glacier is large, and you can see how it wound down the mountain face to spill into the ocean. The backdrop includes two mountains, well over ten thousand feet tall-that's from sea level. They were snowcapped, and the sky draped blue behind it. All around this inlet, glaciers drop from the mountains, but only one other goes all the way to the sea. In total, there are nine glaciers in this one area. There was one that was absolutely stunning. It came down the mountain at a 75 degree angle and flowing under and out of it was a surge of water that looked like a good sized river. It was unthinkable how the glacier maintained its position on the mountain, with all that water lubricating the bottom on such a steep rock face. Amazing.

We spent a good portion of the afternoon traveling the east arm, where we will explore more tomorrow. I took a little nappy because the boat makes me sleepy. When I awoke (actually Deb did the awakening), we boarded the skiff and motored over to shore, with the intent of looking for bears. We found bear scat (poo) but no bears. Kimber pointed out belly holes, where bears have dug holes to lay prone on the ground. Because they put on so much weight in the summer, they like to lay on their tummies in the holes, so they are more comfortable sleeping on their stomachs. Now I know what my dog’s been doing in my back yard!Läs mer