Jeff's Log ~ Thursday, September 25th, 2008

Reid Cove, Alaska

It has again been many days since I have had a chance to write. I had to give up my cabin for Scott’s brother Tom and his girlfriend Kristin. I am now staying in the salon, and have had no time or space to myself since Sunday. The cruising has been absolutely wonderful, and the scenery has been magnificent. We went up Tracey Arm, and tried to make our way to the main glacier, but could not get through the floating ice. We even launched the dingy, and tried to get through, but it was a little too dangerous, as some of the floating chunks out weighed us by tons, and were surrounded with razor sharp edges that were capable of slitting the tubes on the dink.

We went back to the big boat, and towed the dingy back up to the secondary arm which had been choked with ice earlier. The channel had opened by this time, and we were able to get all the way up with the big boat. The Sawyer Glacier was magnificent and impressive, towering about 300 feet above the water, and dropping small calves pretty routinely. We were very close to it and everyone got some very good photos. I again jumped in the dink with Pat, and we took a few more photos of Pipe Dream. There were a couple of seals in the area, but they would not let us get close enough for pictures.
We began our exit after having hot buttered rum, and enjoying the view a little while longer. When we entered the main arm, there was lots of floating ice, and Scott and I took turns navigating the boat through it. We did lightly bump a couple of smaller pieces, but all in all escaped with no damage. We anchored in Tracey Arm Cove going both in and out of Tracey Arm. Tracey Arm Cove is another beautiful spot, which is why we chose to stay there twice. On the second morning, since the dink was still in the water, Pat and I ventured to shore. We were sharing the cove with another small boat owned by a couple from Juneau. The woman was on shore, playing rock toss with their dog. After a brief chat, we hiked up and over the small ridge to see what was on the other side. What we found was another cove with large pieces of floating ice with the sun reflecting off of them, and beautiful snow capped mountains also illuminated with great sunlight. That is something that we haven’t seen much of. We both posed with a chunk of ice that had been left when the tide dropped.

After getting back in the dingy, and beginning our return to Pipe Dream, I noticed a good sized iceberg not far away. The dingy really needed a good, high speed run,(and so did I) so I opened her up and let her run all the way out to the iceberg. It turned out to be a great move, as we were up close and personal with a great piece of nature. The shapes and color were something to behold. I unfortunately had a full memory chip, so again will have to wait for Pat’s photos. We retuned to the big boat, and shipped the dingy so that we could make good time to Reid Cove.