We woke at 6 a.m. aboard National Geographic Sea Bird as we reached our Canadian checkpoint in Prince Rupert on the western coast of British Columbia. Canadian customs agents boarded the ship and then cleared us to set off in our expedition landing crafts to explore the town. We spent the morning and early afternoon walking about this sleepy port village, visiting the Museum of Northern British Columbia and perusing the shops, business-front murals, and cafés. Prince Rupert has a population of more than 12,000 people and is one of the deepest water ports on the western Canadian coast. The city is served by a road system, the Alaska Marine Highway, and a rail system that serves mainland Canada, delivering goods that arrive from overseas by container ship. After we departed, we cruised along the Canadian Inside Passage, watching for wildlife as cumulus clouds built up and drifted overhead, and we passed what at first glance appeared to be a barge adrift in the sound. We realized that in fact what we were seeing was a light station situated on an island in the shape of a small ship. Onto Hecate Strait and Haida Gwaii.
5/10/2025
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National Geographic Sea Bird
Tracy Arm
As we continued our way north through Alaska, we had a favorite stop of mine in Tracy Arm-Fords Terror Wilderness. We had a rainy day, which I enjoy because we can see at higher elevations since the rain turns to snow and, in turn, the snow feeds the absorption zone of the Sawyer Glaciers. We went out in the Zodiacs and navigated around the icebergs and bergy bits, even collecting a piece for the ice melt-off challenge. Once underway out of Tracy Arm, we saw some humpback whales. One whale had an entanglement of line on its fluke. The line was causing an obvious cut to the marine mammal. The correct authorities were notified about the condition of the whale and location of the sighting. Hopefully the whale will be assisted soon and the entanglement removed. Several other humpbacks were seen shortly after, luckily no entanglements on these. They were demonstrating surface feeding behavior, with one lunge feeding and the other making bubbles to catch its prey.
