CRUISING GLACIER BAY

Early this morning two park rangers came by in a small pilot boat alongside our ship and climbed a ladder to get on board. The rangers helped the captain guide our ship up Glacier Bay. We were up bright and early to see the beautiful views of the ice capped mountains on either side of the ship. We went up to the Palm Court to get panoramic views of the bay. The sun was shining brightly as we took turns taking photos of the glaciers. The waiters were coming around with hot chocolate and rum. Hmmmm a great warm drink. The following is what we learned from the rangers as we were cruising.

First of all, we were guided to Reid Glacier, then Grand Pacific Glacier, and finally Margerie Glacier. These are all tidewater glaciers for anything that touches the sea is called a tidewater glacier. Tidewater glaciers are formed in only three places on earth: Chile, Scandinavia, and here in Alaska. Glacier Bay Park includes some 12 tidewater glaciers that calve (break off) into the bay. Calving is when great blocks of the glacier up to 200 ft high break loose and crash into the water. Today, we saw a little bit of calving with the accompanying loud noise as it broke off and crashed into the water. The sound was thunderous and gunshot like. The broken pieces that fall and float on the water are called bergs and these may last a week or more, providing perches for bald eagles, seals, and puffins. These bergs are of different colors. Blue bergs are dense, greenish-black bergs have calved off from glacier bottoms and dark-striped brown bergs carry moraine: rocky rubble picked up along the way.

The impressive blue glacier called Margerie Glacier was 350 ft in height (picture a football field straight up) and was 100 ft in depth below the water line. The Grand Pacific Glacier was 21 miles inland from the water back. It was one mile from the Canadian border. As our ship proceeded down Glacier Bay, we were told that the length of the bay was 65 miles but 250 years ago, the Grand Pacific Glacier was by the sea. It had receded 65 miles in 250 years.

The glaciers were very impressive and we were told by many passengers who had been here 6 times, that they had never had such beautiful sunshine as we had today. The guide mentioned that on average 4 days out of the month of April are sunny so we are very thankful that together with Seward and today, we have been blessed with sunshine.

We hope that when we arrive in Ketchikan, we will have beautiful clear blue skies.