Well, after my midnight decision last night to do a Tracy Arm Fjord boat tour this morning, solo if necessary, I got up early to prepare.
With only a few hours sleep, I called Adventure Bound Alaska as soon as they opened at 7:00 a.m. Though there were several cruise ships in town, the Tracy Arm Fjord tour is usually too long for the cruise passengers to make it back in time before their ship leaves.
Still, I wanted to make sure they had an opening before I got Linda out of bed to drop me off. They had availability, so I meekly asked Linda if she could do me the favor of shuttling me over. I needed to be there by 7:50. Also, I was unsure whether or not I should wake Steve & Esther up to see if either or both of them wanted to go. I went with my gut and let them sleep hoping they wouldn't be too upset for me going rogue.
Linda reluctantly agreed and got up to have a cup of coffee. She wasn't upset that I came up with this idea at the last minute as much as she was disappointed that I wasn't going to Costco with her for our first big keto shopping trip. Unfortunately, the store closes at 6:00 p.m. on Sunday and that's the time I'd be getting back.
Okay, this better be worth it.
So this was an all-day cruise and it was $170, so not cheap, but it seemed like one of the better boat tour values. I got checked in at the Adventure Bound office on the waterfront, and a few of us were shuttled to the boat, the Adventure Bound which was docked among the cruise ships.
The crew said it was full, but it looked like there were 8 - 10 seats open when I arrived.
The boat holds somewhere between 40 & 50 people. It's not a great viewing boat when underway, but there is room outside on the back deck, and you can walk all the way around on the sides where there is more room in the front. But it was far too cold to sit up there while making our run to Tracy Arm.
We pulled out of Juneau a little before our scheduled 8:30 departure time.
Here's a shot of the Mt. Roberts tram rising above one of the cruise liners.
I snagged a window seat and had the three-seat row to myself somehow. I was sandwiched between two pairs of nurses in front of me and some nice folks from Michigan behind me.
After a couple pics at the start, I didn't take any for quite a while on the long trip to get to Tracy Arm. We saw a few Humpback blows near the shore along the way, and eventually we came to our first iceberg which seemed quite out of place.
After the long ride heading south, ....
we veered to the left where there were two branches - the Tracy Arm to the left and the Endicott Arm to the right. Most cruise ships will venture into one of these fjords with the larger ones tending to go to Endicott and Dawes Glacier. Smaller ships may attempt Tracy Arm and either North or South Sawyer Glacier depending on the amount of ice possibly blocking the way.
As we turned into Tracy Arm, the icebergs got way bigger, .....
and they had the beautiful blue color.
At that point, we were still a long way from the glaciers, ....
but all the ice was a good sign that the glacier is calving and we might get a good show.
We made a sharp right turn as the fjord narrowed, ....
and we came to more icebergs and some waterfalls.
This iceberg was massive, ....
and our captain gave us a nice, close look.
I took some video as we maneuvered around the ice.
And I took another short one, as we pulled away. Very cool.
Not far past there, we got our first look at a bear.
This Black Bear was feeding along the shoreline, ....
but it fled as we got a little too close. Here's a little GIF sequence as it took off.
and here's a still shot of that last leap before it disappeared up the mountain.
As we backed away, we got a good look at this pretty Pigeon Guillemot with its bright red legs.
Next was another lovely waterfall.
From there, we motored on.
After yet another waterfall flowing from high in the mountains, ....
and we soon got our first glimpse at South Sawyer Glacier as we followed a small cruise ship in.
Here was the first of many Harbor Seals.
And then we got a much better look at the glacier.
A couple of the smaller cruise ships were parked on the outskirts, and they were shuttling passengers into the glacier on inflatable rafts (aka zodiacs).
Wow, it was gorgeous.
Our captain expertly made his way around this boat and the ice to get us much closer to the face of the glacier than I expected.
There were seals that had just given birth to their pups.
Checking out the glacier with my binoculars, there were large cracks in the ice on the left side ....
and on the right side .....
so we scanned back and forth to the edges hoping for some calving.
But before there was any calving, there were a couple of massive "shooters".
Shooters are huge chunks of ice that break off from the bottom of the glacier underwater and rocket to the surface. The photo above and the one below are of one shooter berg breaking the surface.
Here's another GIF of the sequence.
Wow. In addition to falling ice, these shooters are another reason you don't want to get too close to the face of a glacier.
While waiting for more ice action, we watched the seals.
The little ones were very cute.
As I was zooming in on the blue ice on the left side, ....
a large piece broke off (lower right of the photo below) ....
and splashed. Here's yet another GIF on the calving.
Another thing we watched were the eagles. Apparently, they feed on the afterbirth from the seals.
Eagles are known to kill seal pups, but today they were focused on the placenta from births.
As we sat there, there were some smaller shooters and a lot of small instances of calving.
It was getting time to leave, so I went into the cabin. But I told some of the others to keep watching as glaciers often do their best calving as your boat is leaving.
I took a couple more pictures before putting my camera away.
This one was taken out the back door over the heads of my fellow passengers.
All the other boats and zodiacs were gone, and we were starting to maneuver out of the ice. For some reason, I picked up my phone and started videoing the glacier through the cabin glass. And oh what luck that was. We were witness to a major calving event, and I happened to get it on video.
That was awesome!!
I've also uploaded the video to YouTube, so you can find it at this link: Sawyer Glacier Calving Event, Tracy Arm Fjord, Juneau, Alaska - 6-9-2019.
I picked my camera back up and took several "after" photos where the center of the glacier collapsed, and the ice was stacking up on the left side.
Amazing and beautiful.
I don't know what else to say about that once-in-a-lifetime experience. Still can't believe it.
The seals, however, weren't nearly as impressed.
We moved on - thank you South Sawyer Glacier for a day I'll never forget.
Another small cruise ship moved in behind us not knowing what they just missed.
Oh but we weren't finished. The captain crept into a cove with another waterfall.
He went all the way in ....
and I topped off my water bottle from the waterfall. Others stepped in after me.
After backing out of there, we passed another waterfall.
And the huge iceberg we went around on the way in was now on the opposite side of the fjord.
And next to a waterfall we visited earlier was another bear.
It didn't think much of us, ....
but it had no intention of leaving. And we got some terrific photos.
Its nose was a little scratched up.
I took so many pictures of that bear, and there are so many good shots, I really struggled with choosing which ones to post.
Okay, one more.
It was extremely cooperative, and those are by far the best bear photos I've ever taken.
Not far from there, we saw a third bear, but it ran up the mountain long before we got anywhere near it.
I certainly took enough photos, and should have been content with what I had. But then we saw a couple of whales on the way back.
This one was relatively close - here's an 8-frame GIF from blow to dive.
What a great way to finish this absolutely fantastic day on the water. You never know what you might see on these types of trips. Our trip to Misty Fjords National Monument out of Ketchikan was quite disappointing for the money, but we were very fortunate today and it was worth every penny and then some.
Linda picked me up right on time, and we headed back to the campground.
While I was gone, she went to Costco, Fred Meyer, and Southeast Super Foods as we have eliminated pretty much everything that has any significant carbs, and we needed to stock up on low carb, high fat, moderate protein foods and the various staples that work with a keto lifestyle.
She said it took her all day to reorganize our cabinets and re-label all our food containers. We certainly won't be going hungry, and though there are so many things that are now off limits, we continued to focus on all the fabulous foods we can eat. There has been quite the learning curve for us, but we're doing great. On a day when I don't have much else to discuss, perhaps I'll go into a little more detail. Today wasn't one of those days.
The four of us got together for dinner, and I felt a little guilty for having such a great day on my own. But all was okay, and Esther made a delicious Mediterranean seafood soup with chunks of halibut, crab, and shrimp. Oh my.
And she showed us how to make a 90-second keto-friendly bread in the microwave.
Tomorrow, we ferry to Haines and Esther & Steve will continue on the ferry to Skagway where they will take their RV up to Whitehorse to store it for a couple weeks until they get back from some other obligations. So, this would be our last evening together until they return to Alaska in early July. But with our early ferry in the morning, we didn't stay up too late chatting.
We talked about how wonderful our little Inside Passage journey has been, and we're glad we did it the way we did it spending a few days in each of the port towns along the way. And then we called it a night.
For the next few days, we'll experience Haines, and then we'll drive up the Haines Highway into Canada and then on to the Alaska Highway and back into Alaska for the rest of our trip. We hope you've enjoyed the ride so far. Stay tuned to see what we get into next.
Great wildlife photos and how lucky to get a video of that calving glacier. We’re camped at Campbell River, BC and watch the Alaska cruise ships sail past daily. Saw the Coral Princess in you photo pass by the other day when we were out with friends on their boat.
Safe travels!
Posted by: Colibabas | Monday, June 17, 2019 at 09:39 AM
WOW what fantastic pics! Love the bear photos. This entry made my morning coffee that much better!
Posted by: Susan Anderson | Monday, June 17, 2019 at 10:19 AM
Howard, WHEN you get to that part of the Yukon where they have demolished the highway, be prepared to go SLOW. We towed our HHR with our 28' Dynamax, and that portion of the trip was very, very hard...very washboard like. They rip up the road for 10-14 miles, then move down to where they rip up another section, then they turn around and fix it all (takes all summer)...we faced three of these in a 70 mile section, and at times only went 12 mph because it was that bumpy. Good news, on the way back they had finished two of those three sections and the one they were working on was not as washboard like as it was when we first encountered it. LOVED your inside passage trip...
Posted by: Dave Burdick | Monday, June 17, 2019 at 02:29 PM
I am not sure I have words for this beyond perfect day! You certainly hit the jackpot with getting a taste of everything. Thanks for the awesome videos of the calving and the whale. Love all the bear photos. And I am huge fan of the blue icebergs and blue glacier. Too bad the others missed it.
Posted by: Pamela Wright | Monday, June 17, 2019 at 10:52 PM
That calving video was the best I have ever seen. Also I really didn’t know what shooters were so thanks for that explanation. Also eagles eat the seal placenta?. Gross and pretty cool at the same time!
Posted by: Tracy Perkins | Thursday, June 20, 2019 at 07:18 PM