Captain Scott's Log ~ Monday, September 22nd, 2008

Subject: Glaciers Bears & Whales

On Wed the weather cleared and we had a 2 day sunny window to see the park. First was the Margerie Glacier "that offers the quintessential tidewater glacier experience". Its 200 foot face was higher than the cruise ship that was there. It was very noisy with frequent cracks, groans and booms--often sounding like thunder. That night we anchored close to the Reid Glacier and the next morning dingied in to hike around it. Gill fell in a glacial stream but pressed on and has a good photo of her in a deep blue ice cavern.

Thursday afternoon we saw the Lamplugh and the John Hopkins Glaciers.
This was our best day in the park as the entire John Hopkins inlet is breathtaking with numerous glaciers. We have some good photos of the boat alongside ice bergs.The Lamplugh was the best with alternating layers of blue ice, white ice, and black ice (no yellow ice) and we ventured closer than was safe to photo the boat. Thursday night the 2 days of good weather ended--rain, mist and fog returned. Fri we made the forced march out of the park and back up Icy Strait. 30 kts of wind on the nose with big seas was no fun. But by dark we got into Coot Bay and docked 100 ft from shore on a float. After sunset 2 Grizzlies walked the beach right by us. Today the weather is better and we are headed to Juneau to pick up Tom and Kristian who have just missed their plane and now will arrive on Sunday. This morning we saw Humpbacks jumping and followed them closely for over an hour.