Starr Treks: Alaska journal Saturday 6/20/15 Valdez AK

STARR TREKS Saturday 6/210/15 Valdez AK

We got picked up at 10 AM by the Stan Stephens Glacier and Wildlife Cruise company van, and were taken with another couple from the park, Rick & Reggy (from Indianopolis), to the harbor. There were a few others waiting around the office, then a tour bus showed up with a whole bunch of people (most were from Iowa doing a bus tour of AK). We dressed very warmly as advised by the people in the RV office, and were glad we did. Some of the tour bus people were in shorts, light jackets. You actually could sit inside the whole time if you wanted to, but we spent most of our 7 hour cruise on the upper outside deck. I had all my seasick stuff with me, but the water was very smooth— no problems at all. But as soon as we started cruising faster, it was very cold, and sadly, it was quite overcast— I felt so bad we did not go yesterday instead, when it was pretty sunny out. On the way to the glacier, we passed a forested area where we looked for the “golfball in a tree” — easiest way to spot bald eagles— there were a lot. The ship’s captain did a good job narrating as he steered us along. We passed many waterfalls that tumbled down very high hills, often zigzagging along the mountain sides into the water. The biggest was Anderson Falls— very pretty. We saw a few mountain goats (from a distance), and we saw MANY otters — they are just so cute, often swimming belly up — the captain discussed how they are the only sea mammal that do not have blubber to keep them warm— they have very thick fur coats with like 150,000 hairs per square inch to insulate them. We saw a few sea lions in the water from a distance. Altogether we traveled over 100 nautical miles (each is about 1.14 land miles— or it might be the other way around??).

The captain explained why some of the ice looks a lovely blue color. if I understood it right, the glacial ice is not just frozen water — the ice crystals are so squashed together that big crystals are formed and somehow, absorb all the colors of the spectrum except blue— I don’t really understand it, but indeed many of the ice floes and glacier areas were blue. The little icebergs turn white when they are exposed to air and air gets between the molecules— when the engine was off you could hear a little rice krispie crackling noise of air being absorbed. When we passed thru all the areas of floating ice (it reminded me of the Titanic movie, when all those frozen people floated in the sea with ice floes), we got to Columbia Glacier. The captain said it is called a “catastrophic glacier” because it is actively retreating — this started in 1978, and it has receded 11 miles since then— tour boats then did not travel as far as we had to today. The glacier was magnificent — and the sun came out for us!!! I was so happy, plus I got warmer! We just floated about 30 minutes close to the glacier— we could see — and hear— whenever calving occurred — the larger ones sounded just like thunderclaps.

On the way back, our captain attempted to show us more wildlife. He steered into an area where humpback whales are— we got to see spouting and some whale tails, but never got as close as we wanted to— they spout, and then hold their breath for up to 10 minutes. We then moved along to some coves where there were hundreds of sea lions just laying around on the shore. They are all males! The females congregate in a different area till mating time. They were very noisy— sounded like a barnyard! We saw lots more otters. Then a group of porpoises decided to play with our boat— they swooped around right next to us. I never got any decent photos of them— they were so fast. The captain said the females are actually larger than the males and this was called sexual dimorphism!!

Our captain also gave us some history of the area— how British Captain Cook got credit for discovering Prince William Sound, but Vitus Bering, a Dane, was probably the first explorer. When the Klondike Gold Rush started in 1898, Valdez was advertised as the “all American route” from Seattle— then the poor miners found nothing but a tent city in Valdez, had to climb the Chinook Pass, and many never found any gold at all. There is very little mining of anything here at all any more. He talked about the 1989 Valdez Exxon oil spill— none of the oil actually floated into the city of Valdez — the cleanup cost billions of dollars. A lot of natural recovery has occurred, but he said if you dug holes into some of the beaches, you would still find oil residue. Now they always use little “tractor tugs” to guide the big tanker boats thru, avoiding reefs. We passed the Alyeska Pipeline and terminal which ends in Valdez. The 800 mile pipeline built in 1977 runs from Prudhoe to here, then is emptied directly into large oil tanker ships.

We were pooped when we got back to the RV about 6:30 pm — not that we got any exercise— other than shivering a lot!! We decided to eat out and went to Old Town Burgers that is in the RV park. Larry had halibut fish tacos and I had salmon sticks — they were like fish sticks, but with large hunks of salmon— very good! We decided to stay Sunday night as well, since we are enjoying Valdez, and not sure which direction the smoke from forest fires is going. We are hoping to drive to Anchorage next.