Show Me Some Fin OR A Whale of a Tale

Sunday, June 07,2009 – Day 38

Up at 05:30 this morning to get ready for our whaling adventure.  We had plenty of time to get there as the shuttle bus was right there to meet us at the parking lot to ferry us over to the boat harbour.  There was only one other couple on the bus with us who had arrived even earlier than us. Stephanie and Rich are from Hershey, PA., a younger couple who had flown into Anchorage and rented a motor home to tour Alaska.  They had already been up to Fairbanks, Talkeetna and were now finishing the last few days of their trip on the Kenai Peninsula.  We found that they were big sports fans – Steelers, Pens, and the Penn State Nittany Lions.   They are also big into wildlife, even more so than Janet and I.  They can name more bird and plant species than we’ll ever hope to know.  And Rich has promised that when we go to Pennsylvania he will be our personal tour guide of Gettysburg, of which he is an “student”. (He is so passionate about “the Battle” he said being a tour guide at Gettysburg would be his dream job.)

Rich and Stephanie, had apparently sacrificed their annual trip to Banff/Jasper this year to do Alaska. They have missed passing through Winnipeg on their way there but there is a standing reservation at the Lewis house, if they come our way. They are truly the first American couple that we have met that have an in depth knowledge of Canada. As this was their last night in their RV they were giving away all their belongings that they couldn’t take with them on the airplane.  We were very appreciative of their gifts. (A man who would part with his last 3 Coor’s Light is indeed a friend!) 

Again I digress. The purpose of today’s post is to tell about our trip with Kenai Fjord Tours.  We boarded the catamaran about 7:30 and we left port just after 08:00.  Within the first hour we had sighted our first pod of Orca whales.  After that it was almost non-stop action.  In each new bay that we would enter there was wildlife of some kind.  Thousands of sea birds including cormorants, puffins and just about every type of gull made.  We saw probably six pods of Orcas and probably about 1/2 dozen humpback whales.  There was a mountain goat with a kid, a couple of black bears and for good measure a few eagle sightings. We spent most of the trip at the front of the boat ‘oohing and ahhing” at the scenery and being totally mesmerized by the whales.  It’s strange when the captain sights some whales and he cuts the engines…a quiet anticipation comes over all the people on deck, peering into the ocean ahead: until the whale breaks the surface and spouts through his blowhole.    Everyone immediately starts pointing, clicking cameras and jostling for position along the rail – in general they get very excited. If you are at all interested in wildlife you would be thrilled with a whale watching cruise.

  We also approached within approximately 1/4 mile of the Holgate Glacier.  All of these glaciers are a part of the larger Harding Ice Field which covers a large part of the Kenai Peninsula.  This glacier has been receding in the past few years like so many others.  We witnessed a couple of minor “calving” of the ice into the water – nothing dramatic, but none the less exciting to see.  Even the small calving we witnesses sounded exactly like thunder as it cracked and hit the water leaving a fresh face of blue ice exposed.  We also got to hold a piece of glacier ice.  Ice that would likely be thousands of years old.  We are indeed very small in this world as is our span in years.  But enough philosophy.

We had been speaking with one of the crew members about people getting sea-sick on these boats.  He said that about 10% of people get some level of motion sickness on board.  They call it a “Code Green”.  We asked what he did in a Code Green and his hand went down to his side as if he was a gunslinger and pulled out a pair of surgical gloves, ready for action.  There is some slight rocking and pitching of the boat as it settles into the ocean swells but by and large it didn’t seem too bad at all.

After we returned to port I dragged Janet along for a hike to Exit Glacier.  This is an alpine Glacier as opposed to the Holgate Glacier which is a tidewater glacier.  She was game up to the point where we had to cross the braided streams in front of the glacier.  Unfortunately she wore her runners and not her waterproof hikers and the 5:30 AM morning had caught up to her. She turned back to the interpretive center, while I continued on for a further 1/4 mile to the face of the glacier.    The terminus of the glacier seems to be receding much faster than in earlier years and with global warming this is expected to accelerate.

We returned to the trailer for an early supper, a hot shower and a cozy bed.  Good night!