Alaska Trip – Day 6 (concluded)

As I wrote earlier, we were lined up for a shuttle that would take us up to Eielson Visitor Center. After a stop of about 30 minutes, the bus would return to the WAC. Visitors were free to a) stay at Eielson for 30 minutes, then return on the same bus, b) hang around at Eielson longer and take a later bus back, or c) should availability permit, take a different bus all the way up to the final stop – Kantishna. Kantishna is a location that has lodging facilities as well, though obviously, you would need to have reserved that way way in advance! Needless to say, it is pretty expensive as well.

Because it was a relatively cloud free day, we thought we had a good chance of seeing the mountain, though I knew that if the clouds had settled in that direction, our chances would go down very quickly. High mountain peaks typically generate their own weather system, as we had learned to our detriment in Jungfrau, Switzerland, where we didn’t see the peak even once during our three days in the Lauterbrunnen valley.

For our journey to Eielson, we had an absolutely great shuttle driver – Ken. Here is how Ken introduced himself, true 007 style. “I am Ken. I am from Kentucky, so I am Ken from Kentucky! I am very courteous. At each stop, I like to get down from the bus first to lend a hand to the ladies (and men) getting down from the bus. I have probably held the hand of thousands of pretty ladies – my wife does not mind that at all. So, I am Courteous Ken from Kentucky!” *now say all that with the southern drawl of Kentucky*

I had read elsewhere that though the shuttle bus drivers are not paid to provide any commentary beyond succinct Yes/No/ThankYou kinda comments, quite a few of them try to engage the visitors and keep them entertained. So, when Ken got started, he said that though we were in a shuttle and his job was to only take us to our destination, he would share his experience with us to make it a pleasant journey for all of us.

Ken looked to me as being almost as old as my mother. And his commentary ratified my guess. Right at the beginning of the trip, Ken said that his bride and he had recently celebrated their 52nd wedding anniversary and that though he had been here a few years, he now planned to retire at the end of this season. He also added that he had been married when he was 22, and we could use our math skills to determine his age. His dream was to take his wife to Ireland for a few months, sometime in the future. An amusing take to Ken’s announcing his 52nd wedding anniversary: my mother who is not used to the American accent turned to me and said, he sure looks older than 52!

We went by the official Visitor Center and the nearby dog kennels where the rangers raised dogs for use during the winter months. These dog sleds are one of the few means of transportation across the national park in the winter months. The huskies are raised as puppies and kept there in Denali until they are about nine years old, after which they were retired and released to folks who wish to adopt them. However, because of their body chemistry, these dogs are not given to folks in the lower part of the Lower 48. In other words, if you are from, say, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, etc, you would not be able to adopt these dogs as pets. Needless to say, he also added, not all puppies last the nine years. To be part of the sled team, the dogs need to have the right attitude and be willing to be team players. For more information, he said, the dog kennels are open throughout the day (in the summer months) and they even have demonstrations of the dog sleds three times a day – at 10 am, 2 pm (this I misremembered as 12 noon – *spoiler alert* this was a significant miss … for tomorrow) and 4 pm.

Shortly after that, we were on the Park Road that leads directly all the way into Kantishna. At this point, visitors are permitted to drive in their cars – all the way up to Savage River, which is about 15 miles into the park. We thought that we might do just that tomorrow. One of the visitors coming in an RV in the other direction was straying across the median and so Ken had to take slight evasive action. Soon, he got on his walkie talkie and radioed his base reporting that driver (note to folks driving inside the park: be careful, you might get reported – though I don’t know what could happen if reported – for bad driving. Note that the speed limit is IIRC 25 mph)

Oh, I forgot a small but important detail! When I had started my research, I recall reading about which side of the bus to be seated on, in order to get the best views. As it happened, we were among the middle of the group – but though most of the first few seats had been taken, a few entire rows in the back were still available. By then, I had – of course – forgotten which side was the “right” side to sit on (I believe it is the left)! When I asked Ken as we were boarding, he said “whichever side the wildlife will show up at” 😉

Regardless, as I was climbing up with my mother, I noticed that the first row right behind – and to the right of – Ken was available and took it without a second thought. That turned out to be a good decision as my mother didn’t have to navigate through the bus to get down and get back in. And as she was always the first getting out, it didn’t really hinder the others (though maybe they were delayed by a few seconds). Of course, it was a great move from the view standpoint as well – in addition to the window to our right, we got both the front windows to look out form! The rest of the family took one of the rows toward the back of the bus.

Presently, Ken slowed down the bus and said, “What you are going to see now is going to cost you! You are going to be part of the 30% Club. What is that? Well, look to the left – Denali has decided to reveal himself to you. Only about 30% of our visitors are able to see the mountain without clouds. You will now need to go back to the visitor center concession booth where my wife works, and purchase the souvenirs which state that you are part of this exclusive club.” Forty necks swivelled left and sure enough, there was the Great One!

Denali, the Great One

Moods uplifted, we then stopped to take photos of the sight

Hopefully, he would still be revealed when we got to Eielson, but there were no guarantees. So, we might as well take as many photos as we wanted!

Though folks talk about Denali dominating the landscape, I didn’t get that impression – maybe I had overestimated the term “dominating!” Sure, he still towered above the closer mountains, but because of the distance – we were still about 60-70 miles away, it was difficult to grasp the true difference in height.

The bridge over the Savage River

IIRC, this is the bridge over the Savage River – and tourist traffic cannot go past this point as there is a ranger station right by the bridge. The hut to the bottom left of this photo is one of the earlier huts in the park and is even to this day used by the rangers in the winter months.

Ken explains

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Ken gave a good humorous explanation of these areas of the roadway where there is a steep drop to one side. He talked about how he had come once with his entire clan – wife, kids, grandkids and great grandkids and how a couple of them were a bit scared on the way back.

And we see someone working on the road as we were about to take a turn on it

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So, we waited for him to backtrack a bit …

… and find a point where he could turn off the road

Crossing a Tour Bus

Here we cross one of the Tour buses – these are the ones that are customized air-conditioned (not sure) buses with narration. These do not pick up folks who are using only the shuttle bus system.

At the Polychrome Overlook

Our bus and co-passengers at one of the stops along the route – this is Polychrome overlook where you get to a lot of little hills that change color depending on how sunny, cloudy or rainy it is and the time of day as well. We didn’t notice a lot of variation in the colors during our travel, but if you google, you will notice a lot off color variation.

Notice too, how the clouds are all ranging in that one direction. Had Denali been in that direction, he would’ve been hidden from us.

Vegetation on the hills

This photo indicates how the vegetation stops growing past a certain height on the mountain – because of the weather as well as because of the lack of water which probably drains right into the hill or off of it, I would assume

We’ve still got some distance to go before we get to our closest from Denali

Zooming in on Denali

Zoomed in, I just about got around all of the tourists! I got the feeling that Denali was sweating – as I recently learned, it is actually the snow blowing off the face of the mountain (so, I guess I am justified in making the statement that the mountain is sweating).

Ground squirrel near Eielson Visitor Center

At Eielson Center, a ground squirrel at a Ranger-led walk that we went on. Some of the other tourists had gone hiking up the hill on one side of the visitor center – the other side led down. We were not too keen on hiking, so went with the ranger. That took a good hour.

By this time, clouds had started forming and only the summit of Denali was clearly visible. So, we knew that even if we were to go all the way to Wonder Lake, our opportunities of further sighting for that day was going to be severely limited. However, we decided that we might as well take advantage of the weather and travel further into the park. For tomorrow, we had a 11 am ticket and though we had an earlier ticket for the day after, we were not sure if we would be motivated enough (having already seen Denali) to wake up early and drive in from Talkeetna. And neither of those possibilities would permit us to venture deeper into the park than Eielson.

Therefore, we informed the local dispatcher that we would want to go all the way to Wonder Lake, and he said that the next bus would have space in it, but we would have to turn around back in it, as the bus after that might not have space to bring us back to the WAC.

A hearty Wimbledon breakfast … in Alaska

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At Wonder Lake, there was the option to walk a mile or so each way to Reflection Pond and take a photo of Denali with a reflection. If we hurried, there would be sufficient time to do so and catch the same bus on its way back from Wonder Lake. However, clouds had taken over and – you guessed it, we had bears at the back of our minds, though we had not encountered a single one from the bus – so we decided against trying that hike.

Wonder Lake had clouds around it and the water was also choppy, which is what the drivere had said would be the case at Reflection Pond as well, so in hindsight, not hiking to Reflection Pond was a good decision.

A hearty Wimbledon breakfast … in Alaska

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And here are the solitary wildlife figures we came across during today’s trip (other than the countless hares and ground squirrels, and a few Dall sheep way up the hills): a moose (check out those antlers), and …

A hearty Wimbledon breakfast … in Alaska

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… a caribou (see how these antlers are different from those of a moose)

Our second driver of the day (T.P.) was not as much fun as Ken. I cannot put my finger on one thing that I had a complaint about, well maybe it was that she was not as effusive in giving a commentary (but that could also have been because we were on our way back now and a) everyone was tired, and b) most probably had heard it on the way in). Be that as it may, she did stop at Eielsen where we got out to fill water and admire the scenery (at this point, Denali was no longer visible and we were even wondering if it would rain on us).

We stopped at the Polychrome Overlook for photos, but the grizzly bear eluded us yet again. The folks on the bus – inbound – had apparently spotted a mom and calf but it had been very far away. We – well, to be precise, the other passengers who had industrial strength binoculars – tried to spot them to no avail. We even had a couple of false alarms, but nothind doing – we did see some owls right by the roadside.

Nearing the WAC, it was past eight pm, and our driver slowed down to point out the Riley Creek trestle (railroad) bridge. Many of our co-passengers took photos; Courteous Ken From Kentucky had not pointed this out to us (probably because it was behind us on our way out). I made a note to check it out further tomorrow or the day after, should we get a chance.

Given that it was really late now (past nine pm) when we finally got back – tired – to our cabins, that we had already seen Denali and that the weather was not expected to be as good the next two days, we revised our plans for the next two days.

First thing tomorrow, we would have to check out from our cabins. Then, we would see the folks at WAC to see whether they would offer any refund for the unused tickets. If they did, we would request a refund for my mother’s ticket for the day after tomorrow. Besides, we would relinquish our tickets for tomorrow (which was a free set of tickets anyway, as we had purchased the three-for-two offer). With that in mind, the plan was for us to attend the 10 am presentation of the dogs and their sled, then leave before noon for the Yukon River tomorrow, driving all the way back to Talkeetna. The day after, Mrs. Porcupyn, Baab and I would drive up from Talkeetna, take the bus up to Eielson then return. But you know what happens to the best-laid plans, don’t you? 🙂

Alaska Trip – Day 6

Before I get started, a little perspective on the accommodations. As we were five of us, when I first started looking for accommodation, Carlo Creek Cabins came up as a good fit both for location and price. However, the bigger cabins that could accommodate a group of five were unavailable. As a result, I got two cabins – one for three and the other for two of us. When we reached at night, we were surprised to be greeted by a person who was from just up the road (OK, not literally) from us – in Tallahassee, FL. It was a common theme – most folks in the hospitality industry that we met were there just for the summer – except for our Airbnb hosts in Palmer who moved there from Idaho a while back. When we looked at the cabins in the evening when we landed there, in the rain, we were a bit pessimistic about liking the place – especially with common bathrooms situated outside! I was, as always, apprehensive about the presence (though uncommon) of bears in the area! But it turned out to be just fine. I, for one, loved the area. It is close enough to Denali and the rates are decent for the area for sure. I wish we had stayed there all through our Denali visit. To be honest, the common bathrooms that I had been worried about were actually a boon as all of us could use them at the same time – everyone else had either already left by the time we were ready to use the bathrooms, or they were all yet to wake up!

Next, about the transportation within Denali. Private cars were not allowed past a certain point in the National Park, and we were to be in the area for the most part of three full days. We were not planning to get the Tour bus tickets as I had researched that the shuttle buses can get us all the way into the park and the tour bus tickets were a) more expensive and b) liable to be sold out way in advance. When I then learned that there is an option to three shuttle bus tickets for the price of two, I decided that that would be the way to go. We would just get three days of tickets to an area reasonably within the park, and on the day that we had good visibility and weather, we would purchase the add-on option to go all in.

Now, some of this information is not really spelled out in either the Denali National Park website nor in the websites you get redirected to (or it is, I missed it entirely!!): when you purchase your shuttle bus ticket, you are coupled to a specific shuttle bus that goes to a specific point in the park. You could buy a ticket up to the Toklat River on, say, the 8:30 am shuttle bus that goes to Eielson Visitor Center. That means that you cannot take a shuttle bus that departs at any other time, unless of course, that bus has availability. If you decide to get down at an intermediate stop, say, Teklanika Campground, your further journey to Toklat can continue only if and when a bus comes from the Wilderness Access Center (the WAC, or the main visitor area to board the bus) that is going further into the park. We were advised to stay in the shuttle until our destination – it would be easier to find a bus returning to the WAC that had extra space than it would be to find out going into the park. That said, you are free to get down at any of the intermediate stops and spend as much time as you feel like doing – as long as you are aware that there was a chance that you might not get all the way to your original destination.

I decided to get the three-for-two tickets upto the Eielson Visitor Center, as there was the option of purchasing a ticket from there all the way into the park. Besides, at this location, there is enough space to sit, eat, drink water, use the restroom etc. So, I thought that should we need to split up for whatever reason, those of us who are tired or otherwise don’t want to go further could wait for the others to go (either further on the bus or on a hike) and return. When purchasing the tickets, you need to specify the timings as well. I used 8:30 am for the first day, 10:30 am for the second day and 9:00 am for the third day (of course, later on I realized that it would be a haul to make it to the 9:00 am departure if coming from Talkeetna!!). That way, I hoped that either on the first or the third day, we could venture further than Eielson – it was out of the question for the second day unless we were prepared to return late in the night (and remember, this is the day we were moving our base from Denali to Talkeetna). There is still more to come on this point, but that will come later 🙂

Eielson Visitor Center is located about 60 miles from the WAC, and is one of two places in the park where you can get water to drink IIRC. The shuttle bus takes about four hours one way to get to this point. Intermediate halts occur every 90 minutes, give or take a few minutes, for folks to get out and use the restrooms and take photos. I had been very antsy about this as well, for fear of wildlife, but was assured that if wildlife was spotted close to the road, the bus drivers are instructed not to let people out of the bus at the stop.

Be that as it may, we were up early in the morning and quickly got ready by about 7:15 am. By now, the sky was much clearer than it was last night. Looking up – in certain directions, one could see blue sky with not many clouds while in other directions, there were clouds. But it was much better than last night. Here is a comparison:

Last night as we were driving to the cabins

This morning while driving to Denali from the cabins

We got to the WAC by about 7:45 and got our tickets ratified and got in line for the bus.

While waiting in line, we had our first view of the local wildlife

As Hindus, per our religion, one of our gods is Ganesha, the remover of obstacles. His vehicle of choice is the puny mouse. Looking at the animal in front of us on the deck of the WAC, I commented that if the mount is here, surely the god must be around the corner, removing our obstacles? 🙂

Alaska Trip – Day 5 (concluded)

Folks had chastised me for the decision to use Palmer as a base. But that was a minor blip compared to what I did for my later planning!!

Back when I had originally started planning the trip, I had found out that it is rare to sight Mt Denali. In fact, after asking about Alaska on a couple of bulletin boards, the information I received was downright disheartening. Folks said that the best time to see the mountain was in winter; or one needed to plan for a week’s stay to ensure that there would be a window of opportunity.

Thoroughly dismayed, I decided to spread the trip out to chance a change in weather if we were to encounter bad weather up front. So, I decided thus:

– two days in Anchorage
– a travel day
– two days in Denali
– one day in Fairbanks (friends had visited Fairbanks and I got the impression that there was a lot to do out here as well – the Dalton Highway, the Alaska pipeline, and hot springs)
– a travel day
– one day in Seward for a cruise
– two days in Denali (in case we missed the mountain the first time, here would be our reason to do so
– drive to Anchorage to fly out

I had even put in a deposit for the Denali area cabins because everyone had said that those are the toughest to get, and I wanted to take no chances on losing those.

Then, after spending some more time researching, I calculated travel times and went, “What the heck was I thinking?!!” We’d be spending half the time on the road with that schedule. So, I decided to change the schedule around to have four continuous nights in Denali as opposed to splitting them into two sets of two. If we spend four days and four nights (counting it from afternoon the first day to the noon of the fifth day) in the Denali area, hopefully we can at least glimpse Denali on one of the days, even if the view is not perfect. And here’s where I made – what we all agreed – my biggest mistake.

My friend who had visited Alaska before us had used Talkeetna as a base for a portion of his trip and had done the Denali flyby and the glacier landing out of there. While I didn’t fancy the flight for two reasons – a) no factor of safety and b) too expensive – I assumed that Talkeetna would be as good a base as any to get to Denali. At the time of this decision making, what I didn’t realize was that Talkeetna is closer to Anchorage than it is to Denali!

And why did Talkeetna even figure as a factor? Well, by the time I looked at our schedule and decided that it needed to be changed, the cabins were unavailable for the revised (final) dates as outlined in the opening post. All alternatives were more expensive, and Talkeetna looked as good as any other. I reserved it, meaning to come back to it and change it if necessary. In the event, I never got around to revising it. By the time I found out how far exactly Talkeetna was from Denali, we were stuck with it.

And this decision got even worse soon. Why?

Well, as you have read thus far, we were in no position to go north of Denali on Day 5. By the time we reached Denali in a steady drizzle, it was past 8 pm!! Knowing how badly I wanted to drive up to the Dalton Highway, Mrs. Porcupyn bravely volunteered to come with me right then and there. But if anything, I know my limits!! So, we quashed that plan and decided to just get something to eat near the park and retire for the night. With the drizzle coming quite steadily, though the front desk person who checked us in at the cabins said that the weather was supposed to get better tomorrow (but be cloudy and rainy the day after), it was not looking good.

Alaska Trip – Day 5

My original plan for the day was for us to get ready early in the morning, then go up to Hatcher Pass and check out the scenery there, then drive over to Matanuska Glacier and decide whether it was worthwhile to walk over to the glacier. Then, by about noon, drive over to our cabins near Denali, reaching there at about 4-5 pm, we could then decide who would be interested to join me to a drive up to Yukon River and back, leaving the rest in the cabin. Folks had advised that it would be a very long day, but I had thought that I could do it and get back to Denali by, say, 1 am – which wouldn’t be too bad to do in the middle of summer. Well, that was the plan, anyway!

A hearty Wimbledon breakfast … in Alaska

We finally woke up at about eight am and had a very good breakfast that our host had prepared for us. In honor of Wimbledon, that they never watch anyway (I would bet on this, based on the fact that the TV was not turned on anytime while we were there), we had waffles with strawberries and whipped cream. All of us asked for seconds 🙂

It is now nine am, and we are still twiddling our thumbs. So, I decided to bite the bullet and decided to drive up to Hatcher Pass. Only Baab was willing to come with me. It had been drizzling all night long, and host also said that there might not be much to see near the Pass, conditions being what they were. We soldiered on, regardless. It was nice to see the little Su river by the roadside and high school kids practicing for cross-country skiing. They were maintaining really good time. The scenery was nice as well with greenery all around and low clouds as well. However, by the time the road started to climb, we were in near white out conditions. There were clouds all around us. Besides, at this point, the car informed me that we were low on fuel too. So, we decided to turn around and back to the Airbnb. Hopefully, the rest of the family was ready by now!

Not really! We had asked our hosts if we could do some laundry (it was a good thing we did!) and so, that had taken some time out of the morning, as the laundry equipment was in a bathroom that was being used by other guests. In any event, by the time everyone was ready to a steady drizzle, it was nearly noon. But I still wanted to visit the Matanuska Glacier and no one had any objections to that, as the Yukon plan was also mine alone (i.e., it would not impact their rest of the day)!

The Matanuska River flows by the road (Glenn Highway, which connects Parks Highway to Valdez)

… but the road quickly gains elevation …

… which gives us good views of the river

We went past the official viewpoint, trying to find the trailhead, then stopped at a store that was selling Alaska souvenirs for tourists. The store manager informed us that the trailhead was just around the corner, but the fee was $30 per person. Considering that we were definitely not prepared for bears, and the light conditions and the weather were not really that good anyway, we decided to turn around and head to the glacier viewing location.

One of the explanatory boards near the Matanuska Glacier viewpoint

Matanuska Glacier view

It was raining quite heavily by now, when we got to the Matanuska Glacier viewpoint. But we managed to hang around long enough for some photos. Here is one that shows the mighty glacier. It was initially tough for us to pronounce the name of the glacier until Katya pointed out that the name almost rhymes with that of her friend (also, an Indian movie star) Anushka. After that, it was pretty easy to say Matanuska 🙂

By now it was past one pm, and we headed right back towards Palmer (and then Denali). Enroute, however, a restroom break turned into a grocery shopping excursion, and shopped an hour more off our rest of the day.

Driving through a steady drizzle even after we crossed Talkeetna, we abandoned any hope of being able to see Denali from either of the viewpoints by the highway.

Alaska Trip – Day 4 (concluded)

I forget if it was after our first cruise or our second cruise, but one day we were returning from Whittier and suddenly, I saw this pull-out on the left where I wanted to stop for photos. I made the left turn, parked, and we were enjoying the water and taking photos of the scenery, when a guy came up to us and said something about water trickling down from the mountain and that it was really nice. He had with him a five gallon jug full of the water.

So, we look across the road and, sure enough, see these people filling up their containers (bottom right of photo) 🙂

Monkey see monkey do! We joined the queue and grabbed a few bottles of water for ourselves.

The pipe had all sorts of “artwork” stickers on it!

That night, when we got back to our Airbnb, I researched the – for lack of a better term – water fountain and got some interesting articles, such as this one.

From that time on, each time we swung by that area of the road near milepost 109 of Seward Highway, we made it a point to fill up our water bottles with the refreshingly cool and clear water off the mountain. I don’t know what the flyertalk locals have to say about it, but for sure, other than one day, each day we saw folks in a queue for the water, some with up to ten five gallon jugs, which they were then lugging and making a dash across the road!

Here is a good video of the bore tide – we didn’t see anything close to it. I would assume that it had passed by us by the time we got there.

The Fly Swatter Lady had informed us about the option of hiking to a place from where one could see the Portage Glacier. So, as we came off the cruise, we decided that three of us – Mrs. Porcupyn, Baab and I – would try out the hike and the other – Katya and my mother – would stay in the car. As we were not confident of going all the way up (it was drizzling just a little bit), we said that we would be back in 30-45 minutes.

As we started the hike, the climb was not too bad, and there were others on the hike as well. So, my initial fear of bears went down a bit. At this point, we decided that we would go all the way to the view point. Mrs. Porcupyn was lagging a bit, so she suggested that we go up and she would try to make it if she could. As there were others on the trail, we were OK with that.

Every so often, we turned around to look at the scenery behind us. Prince William Sound looked nice from the height we had gained.

Soon (but not nearly soon enough as it was already about 40 minutes since we left the parking lot), we were at the view point and took in the splendor of Portage Glacier. The medial moraine to the left of center of the photo is formed because of the little arm of the glacier joining it. From what I read online, a few decades ago the glacier covered the entire lake and more. Thankfully, it has been holding steady at the present location for the last two decades.

We could have gone all the way down to Portage Lake and dipped our toes in the icy cold water (which, btw, we never once did on the whole trip – should have tried once!), but at this point, we were worried that Katya and my mother would be worried that we had not returned in time. So, once we were done taking a few photos, we started the hike down which was a bit slippery at some places because of the gravel. But we were able to navigate it all without too much fuss, and though by now the drizzle had gotten a bit steadier, we managed to get to the car without our jackets getting wet. I was warm/hot enough to not even need to use the jacket that I had brought to the hike with me and was sweating by the time we reached the car.

We were glad that we got to do what we did. Just like it happens when one needs to plan out a trip really early to get flight tickets, after the initial surge of excitement, one tends to fall back from planning details. As it so happened, once I paid for the flight tickets, the hotels, the cruises, and the bus(es), I got a bit complacent and stopped researching further – our trip was still four months away at this point.

As a result, I had not really planned for anything past the cruises and the bus(es) in Denali. Therefore, had we not been early the first day to get the chance to talk to the Fly Swatter Lady, we might not have done anything at all but drive right back. Because of her advice, we had some extra memories to take back with us 🙂 Too bad, I never asked her name, but if you happen to see her happily swatting flies at the parking lot that houses Phillips Cruises and Major Marine Tours in Whittier, do thank her on our behalf!

Our engagements in Whittier complete, we then drove back to Palmer. I’ve already addressed feedback about using Palmer as a base. Tomorrow is when we learn that it was the smaller of my planning boo-boos!

Alaska Trip – Day 4 (continued)

Without further ado, let’s continue with Day 4 of our trip. When I last stopped writing, we had just about reached Whittier. Today we didn’t leave the boarding area. In fact, unlike yesterday when we had been among the last few to board, today we were near the front of the queue (there is no difference though, as your seats are pre-assigned by the folks at Major Marine).

As we pushed back from the marina, we saw the train leaving the station as well. The backdrop against the mountain and the hanging glacier was captivating. I wonder if Whittier gets hit by avalanches in winter – that glacier is right on top of the mountain next to town!

Up on that road is where we were yesterday in the evening after the cruise, following the directions of Fly Swatter Lady.

Land Ho! Our ranger for the day appears to be the 21st century of Long John Silver (Treasure Island – R.L. Stevenson)

A tidewater glacier (though I forget which one is which – we visited the Beloit and Blackstone glaciers)

A close up of the glacier

Micro icebergs coming off the glacier

Getting closer to a glacier

A little waterfall created by snowmelt off the glacier

Another rookerie, though we didn’t get much closer to this one

Looks like a giant chunk of ice-cream, does it not? I bet those crevasses are a few stories high

The glacier is really massive

A cruise ship enters College Fjord – this is the one which has a bunch of glaciers named after colleges in North-East USA. One of the few glaciers in the area that is advancing is the Harvard glacier in College Fjord. This is one of the few fjords that are passable by cruise ships, so they routinely spend a day in there

Alaska Trip – Day 4

Our first full day in Alaska had been very nice. The weather was nice and warm, though not sunny, and we did not need to warm our warm clothes (though we had taken them with us). We had gone on the Surprise glacier cruise which is Major Marine Tours’ competitor for the more famous (I think) 26-glacier cruise.

Neither of the cruises in Prince William Sound were advertised to attract whales and orcas, so we hadn’t been thinking of those. However, I had hoped to catch a calving glacier or two. The amount of time we had in front of Surprise glacier was definitely not enough to catch one, so we hoped today would be our lucky day. Today, we were making a U-turn in PWS going to Blackstone glacier. Hopefully, it would calve for us…

On our way to Whittier today, we were a bit more relaxed. For one thing, we’d done the same drive yesterday. Plus, we had more time on our hands as today’s cruise was an hour later than yesterday’s. Moreover, we had managed to get ready and leave at about the same time. So, we spent a bit more time looking around while enroute.

So it was that we had our first encounter with the Bore Tide.

Though not really the Bay of Fundy, the tide that rolls in here into the Turnagain Arm has supposedly measured over twenty feet at its peak. Of course, we did not know that at the time, so we were a bit curious at the action of the water and the lack of waves of any significant height (unlike in, say, Australia or California’s Pacific Coasts).

Getting near Portage Valley, after seeing a few tourists and emboldened that the presence of a bear there was unlikely, we took a short walk in the woods to take a photo of a lake (this was not Portage Lake) and the glacier behind it.

Unnamed glacier

Portage Lake

Byron Glacier

By the time we went back to the Portage-Whittier Road and reached the tunnel, we got to get in line in the staging area. Unlike yesterday, we were not lucky enough to breeze through today. That was a good thing, as we got to get out of the car once more and check out the area …

… including this glacier facing Portage from the tunnel

Tour buses were also there in full force – there was a separate queue for high occupancy vehicles, and they were given priority once we got the signal to go through the tunnel. Oh BTW, the tunnel costs $13 now (inbound into Whittier) and there is a parking fee at Whittier as well. We paid $10 each day.

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This glacier faces Whittier from north east of the tunnel (I had researched this area when planning the trip, but have forgotten the name of this glacier). Anyway, we couldn’t have gone anywhere close to it.