Columbia Glacier Cruise

 August 12, 2015

The day after our arrival in Valdez we went on the Columbia Glacier Cruise. This was another of those all day cruises where we were hoping to see more wildlife and calving of the glaciers.

Another of the Deadliest Catch boats was in this morning, the Kodiak.

 Everywhere you look up here you will see glaciers, to the point (almost) of...oh, another one. But they are always pretty. We enjoyed them while we were there as they are shrinking at an alarming rate, which means it won't be long before they are all gone.

 The water falling from these glaciers is also something we will miss seeing when the glaciers themselves are gone. Water is a powerful force and takes the path of the least resistance, cutting through the silt and loose rock to find it's path to the water below, be it river, lake or the Puget Sound. I love the waterfalls best I think. Other than just plain beautiful, to hear their roar and feel their power when you are close to one of them gives me goose bumps!

 Notice the shear drop the water makes in the middle of this falls?

 This Eagle was perched on a tree on an island, watching for his next meal

 Everywhere you look is the beauty of Mother Nature. I have fallen in love with the rugged beauty that is Alaska. I can now understand why a lot of service people who get stationed up here end up staying here. This vast land is truly beautiful and it is the 'Last Frontier'

 More Sea Otters, the playful creatures of the sea, and Phil's favorite!!

 We start to see ice bergs floating in the water from the Columbia Glacier

 Just like watching the clouds roll by, you begin to see shapes in the ice. This one is either a bear, laying on his back and holding his hind paws up...or it's a duck with it's tail fluffed in the rear. What do you see?

 The Alaska State Ferry cruises through the Prince William Sound

 Seal pups playing in the water

 and soaking up some rays

 A Mom and her pup

 This is the Captain of our boat, and her crew were mostly females as well...Yea!!

 I used to think these were just snow topped mountains, and in the winter time, they are. By the middle of August, they are pure glaciers.

This one gives me a better idea of what the Ice Age must have looked like

 We are getting closer to our destination and seeing more bergs floating through the water

The Columbia Glacier, still a couple of miles out

 We have to carefully maneuver through the ice field

 I am not a geologist, but in plain speaking, here it is as I understand it...note the line of ice in the water sort of like an invisible line that says do not cross. This is due to a line of ground up rock that is laying on the ocean floor, left by the glacier when it was out far enough to have covered the rock to the right. Somehow this keeps the ice from flowing out the sea. When a glacier flows all the way to the water, it is called a Tidewater Glacier. Each Tidewater Glacier maintains it's own ice field in this manner. Only the biggest bergs manage to escape through this line

 We carefully broach the ice field to get a closer look

We were told that the glacier face is approximately 300' high (above the water) and the glacier below the surface is approx 600'

 This piece just fell off of the glacier, called calving. Phil got a video of it and has placed it on You Tube if you want to find it. It is an amazing piece of video!!

 We were all watching the piece with the big crack in it, ice chunks had been falling from it the whole time we were there, and it leaned a little bit, but didn't fall while we were there. This glacier is one of the most rapidly receding glaciers in the world, currently loosing about 85' a day. From 2001 through about 2006 it is recorded as loosing upwards of 91' per day. The bluer ice is where the glacier has calved most recently.

We were not allowed to go any closer than about 1/2 mile from the face of the glacier, but even that close, it was cold. The glacier seemed to generate it's own wind and when it gusted, it was really cold!

These little Sea Otters don't seem to mind the cold, but their fur is specially designed to keep them warm

 These larger bergs escaped through the barrier line

 This berg rolled just as we approached it, sure freaked all the birds out!!

 This is the same berg as above, when it settled after rolling. I thought it looked like a Sea Otter laying on it's back

 Speakiing of which

 This float plane was coming into a little cove, just out of site of the boat.

 These seals will do anything to find a place to catch some rays...look closely, there are three on this buoy.

This is a really big ice berg and it looks like the seals have taken up residence. Notice the pot holes? I think the seals body heat has made these holes in the ice, but I could be wrong. Just a guess on my part.