Williams Cove and Tracey Arm, Alaska
It was a gray on gray, drippy morning as the Sea Bird pulled into Williams Cove to drop anchor for our first outings of this voyage. Since Southeast Alaska is really a place of water with illusions of land—a temperate rain forest—it felt just right to put on our rubber boots and head for the mud and wade through the swollen creeks and feel the soaking of the wet grasses on our legs. Some of us explored this peaceful cove in kayaks and visited the stunning waterfall, circled graceful icebergs and watched harbor seals sticking their periscope heads above the still waters to watch us watching them. Others of us went ashore to explore the beaches, meadows and forests—bear scat was abundant and a young black bear was sighted on the far shore of the bay. And yet other ate our way through the time ashore with delicacies like rice root, cow parsnip, salmon berries, false lily of the valley berries and false salmon seal berries.
During lunch, the Sea Bird weighed anchor and began the 18 mile transit of Tracey Arm, a stunning, glacially carved fjord. Five thousand foot peaks of solid rock towered above us and waterfalls cascaded on both sides of the ship as we made our way deeper toward the core of the wall of rock that make up the coastal mountains of Southeast Alaska. Along the way, we were beckoned to come quietly to the bow of the ship to watch an adult black bear foraging along the rocky coastline in search of seashore goodies. It is said in Southeast Alaska that when the tide is out the table is set…and so it was for this bear munching away on rockweed and other intertidal delicacies. We spent the late afternoon weaving our way through the ice ejected from the South Sawyer glacier, the Captain maneuvering us to within ½ mile of the glacier face—closer than the ship had come all season. There we watched over 200 harbor seals hauled out on ice floes and also watched huge chunks of the glacier calving into the fjord with the cracking of “white thunder.” During the afternoon two wilderness rangers and their kayaks came aboard and stayed to answer our questions at the evening recap and also joined us for dinner before setting forth again in their little kayaks for the last two days of their eleven day patrol. What a rich and full day we had as an introduction to this land of great beauty and great surprises. And thus ended day one of our voyage through the wilds of Southeast Alaska.
It was a gray on gray, drippy morning as the Sea Bird pulled into Williams Cove to drop anchor for our first outings of this voyage. Since Southeast Alaska is really a place of water with illusions of land—a temperate rain forest—it felt just right to put on our rubber boots and head for the mud and wade through the swollen creeks and feel the soaking of the wet grasses on our legs. Some of us explored this peaceful cove in kayaks and visited the stunning waterfall, circled graceful icebergs and watched harbor seals sticking their periscope heads above the still waters to watch us watching them. Others of us went ashore to explore the beaches, meadows and forests—bear scat was abundant and a young black bear was sighted on the far shore of the bay. And yet other ate our way through the time ashore with delicacies like rice root, cow parsnip, salmon berries, false lily of the valley berries and false salmon seal berries.
During lunch, the Sea Bird weighed anchor and began the 18 mile transit of Tracey Arm, a stunning, glacially carved fjord. Five thousand foot peaks of solid rock towered above us and waterfalls cascaded on both sides of the ship as we made our way deeper toward the core of the wall of rock that make up the coastal mountains of Southeast Alaska. Along the way, we were beckoned to come quietly to the bow of the ship to watch an adult black bear foraging along the rocky coastline in search of seashore goodies. It is said in Southeast Alaska that when the tide is out the table is set…and so it was for this bear munching away on rockweed and other intertidal delicacies. We spent the late afternoon weaving our way through the ice ejected from the South Sawyer glacier, the Captain maneuvering us to within ½ mile of the glacier face—closer than the ship had come all season. There we watched over 200 harbor seals hauled out on ice floes and also watched huge chunks of the glacier calving into the fjord with the cracking of “white thunder.” During the afternoon two wilderness rangers and their kayaks came aboard and stayed to answer our questions at the evening recap and also joined us for dinner before setting forth again in their little kayaks for the last two days of their eleven day patrol. What a rich and full day we had as an introduction to this land of great beauty and great surprises. And thus ended day one of our voyage through the wilds of Southeast Alaska.
