April 9-10
Hi All,
Glacier Bay…..we spent 10 days here last Sept and plan to spend another 6 days now in April. Last fall we had gorgeous weather, this time a late winter series of LO’s are passing through giving us lots of rain….very misty, mystical looking:)))) Kathy and I have learned to accept whatever Mr Weather gives us and to try and find the beauty in each weather scene. Our first night we anchored off Russell island and nature just exploded around us, in spite of all the rain/mist and low clouds. We arrived and anchored around 5:30pm and for the next few hours we just sat in the PH and watched about 40 otters playing, hunting and eating, many with pups, ~10 Harbor porpoises were feeding all around the channel in front of us and then all around Mystic, when you stepped outside you could hear a gazillion water falls all around, and then the birds….a lone Bald Eagle perched on a log on the beach holding court to whom I’m not sure, many scoters, too many types of ducks to name, et al
. Even the low mist hanging on the mountains….well, I wish I was a better writer to articulate but it was just magical!!!!
Glacier Park certainly ranks up there with the beauty and majestic scenery/nature show of what we saw in the Aleutians, Katmai, Kenai, Kodiak and Prince William Sound last year…..we were told by Doug and Jill on sv Companera last year in PWS….very experienced, worldly cruisers…..they have been to GP maybe 15 times and will keep coming back as long as they can….indeed, I think they have it right…..wow, wow, wow….thank you Mother Nature for this beauty!!!
I wrote this last year for a bit of history: Just 250 years ago GB was all glacier and no bay. A massive river of ice, roughly 100 miles long and thousands of feet deep, occupied the entire Bay. Today that glacier is all gone, receded far to the north. About a dozen tidewater glaciers remain and a total of 50+ in the Park. Captain George Vancouver in 1794 sailed this area and described it as one massive glacier!! In 1879, 85 years later John Muir visited the bay by canoe and found the glacier had receded 41 miles and doing so at about a mile/year. Muir built a cabin on Muir Inlet (East Arm) and studied the area for many years. It was the Tlingit native tribe that had settled this area for many thousands of years. They had a summer fishing village in Bartlett Cove but were forced to leave when the ice came in 1750!!
We left Bartlett Cove on Tuesday, April 9 around 11am…..we thought slack at Sitakaday Narrows….about 5nm away…was at noon…..well, at least our tide tables said so…..turned out the tide had already turned and we had 1-1.5kt flood current…..go Mystic go. We first went to S. Marble Is to see the huge stellar seal lions….yep, still there along with the cormorants….maybe 200-300 some with pups….yep, same old seal “odeur” when we got downwind…..such a delight to see. Next was Gloomy Knobby Hill to see the white, mountain goats….yep, still there…..saw 21, wow….curious almost all of them were up high near the top of the mountain…..why we don’t know…it was raining, cold, 10-15 kt winds….why weren’t they down low….where we could get a better view…..but out of the weather????
We anchored last year in the recommended anchorage on Russell Island….about 46nm from Bartlett Cove….a little cove but deep and too near a little rocky island…Kathy did not care for it at all….so this time we found our own anchorage…across from Russell Is off the mainland….60-75′ deep in mud/broken rocks…..the tides are 15-20′ now…..wow, calm and the scenery all around was DDG. We woke up to partial sun on the huge mountains invisible to us the night before but we knew they where there from our time last fall…..DDG…..and the Harbor porpoises greeted us early playing all around Mystic….well, good morning to you guys too…how did you sleep, finding anything good for breaky….I really did expect one to start playing Flipper:)))
We saw 5 major glaciers: Grand Pacific, Margerie, John Hopkins, Lamplugh, and Reid plus ~6 minor ones high up on the slopes/mountains….holy glaciers batman!!!! The Grand Pacific was the granddaddy of it all and has now receded way up the mountain. Now you see this 200′ wall of mud/rock/soil where the glacier had once been maybe 40 years ago. Next to it is the Margerie glacier….this is the iconic glacier for GB….the one you see all the pictures of blue ice and dramatic calving. We got to within 700-800 yards last year but no way this time…..note to self…..glacier viewing in early Spring….much, much more ice flow…..we could only get to within 1.9 miles of the glacier….so much ice flow….we even experienced ice bergs maybe 5 miles away……and, while we saw evidence of calving we saw none!!
Grand Pacific: 2 miles wide, 34.5 miles long, slowly receding, thinning
Margerie: 1 mile wide, 21 miles long, 250′ above water, stable
John Hopkins: 1 mile wide, 12.5 miles long, advancing ~1 mile/year, thickening
Lamplugh: 0.75 miles wide, 180′ above water, 16 miles long, stable to receding, thinning
Reid: 0.5 miles wide, 130′ above water, 9.5 miles long, slowly receding, thinning
I think the John Hopkins glacier/inlet is one of the most dramatic/majestic glaciers we have seen….it’s just not the glacier itself but the surrounding mountains….6 mountains surrounding the glacier….Fairweather, 15k’, Quincy Adams, 13.5k’, Salisbury, 12k’, Lituya, 11.7’k, Orville, 10.5’k, and Abbe, 8.7k’…..just huge when you see from sea level…..and snow, so much snow!!!!
Weather: ODG….Mr Weather played with us all day…broken sun in the am at the anhcorage, broken sun viewing Margerie and Grand Pacific, then solid low clouds, then as we rounded the point into John Hopkins inlet….voila….sun and blue sky…..WOW, WOW, WOW….yep, this gets the 3 WOW’s…..ODG…..we stopped Mystic maybe 5 miles out and were mesmerized by the beauty!!! Now this inlet is closed from 5/1 – 6/30 and no cruise ships to 8/31 due to a harbor seal habitat/pupping area. We saw lots of seals last year but none this year….maybe too early….but, we could only get to w/in 1.9 miles of the glacier due to so much ice flow so maybe they were right next to the glacier like last fall??
On our way out of Tarr inlet and almost to John Hopkins inlet we saw more stellar sea lions hauled out on some rocks….so, we stopped for a look….ODG….a few gigantic bulls, maybe the largest we have ever seen…..and loud:))))
After the John Hopkins Glacier….well, we were exhausted…..not sure why….but it just took our breaths away…..so we gave Lamplugh glacier a fly-bye and went to our anchorage about 1 mile from Reid glacier….DDG…..very sunny and blue sky…..so much snow we were blinded:)))) And more wildlife…..otters everywhere and birds…..many rafting, preening, mating rituals…..mainly surfscoters and buffleheads…. we were entertained for hours from these guys as well as observing the glacier….I mean, pretty cool to anchor in front of a glacier!!!!
The Plan: As of writing this blog we have moved to Hugh Miller Inlet on Thursday 4/11…closed from 5/1 – 9/15….and will stay for 2 nights and rest up…..and do some prawning:)))
Critter Stats:
Dungeness crab: 9
Prawns: 2 Spotted
Whales: 10 Humpbacks
Salmon: 0
Bears: 1
Wolves: 0
Otters: 200+, ~50% with pups
Mountain Goats: 21
Stellar Sea Lions: ~300
Hope all is well!
John
Mystic Moon
Muir Inlet Glacier Park
GO MYSTIC GO!!
Position: 58 55’58.80 N, 136 46’27.86 W
Course: Stopped.
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