Category Archives: Glacier Bay

Glacier Bay, Alaska, August 7, 2018

. Alaska, At Sea, Cruise, Glacier Bay, Glaciers, Holland America Line, Noordam, Photography

If you are visiting Alaska a trip into Glacier Bay is a once in a lifetime experience.  We stopped to pick up a park ranger (Glacier Bay is a national park) around 8am.  She narrated our trip into the bay, pointing out interesting things along the way.  “Look, at 2 o’clock, there are some mountain goats.  See those little white dots half way up the mountain.  There they are,” she would tell us.  Unfortunately, I was did not see any goats or bears or any wild life.  What I did see was nature; rivers of ice, mountains, waterfalls, glaciers, clouds and mist.  I did my best to capture it for you.

Lets start with a photo taken from my seat in the Explorations Cafe, as we entered the bay.

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Update, August 10, 2018

. Alaska, Glacier Bay, Haines, Juneau, Ketchikan, Noordam

Since my last update we have visited Haines, Juneau and, today, we are in Ketchikan.  It rained each and every day until we arrived here today.  Funny thing is that Ketchikan is the rainiest town in Alaska.  It is warm and sunny with a slight breeze.

The scenery everywhere we look is wonderful.  Eventually you will see what I mean when I can post some of my photos.  The misty clouds floating around the mountain peaks in Glacier Bay and elsewhere provide interesting, photogenic views.  I tried to capture what I felt and in one or two instances I think I succeeded.  You’ll just have to wait until I get better internet service.  When we reached the end of our voyage in Glacier Bay we arrived at Margerie and Grand Pacific Glaciers.  While there we were fortunate to see Margerie calf.  Throughout the journey into Glacier National Park we endured rain and wind gusts of over 40 miles per hour and it was all worth it.

The next day we were in Haines where, once again, we were treated to a windy, rainy day.  I hate to sound like a broken record but the weather is what the weather is.  Haines is a pleasant little town.  Not much to do in the town but lots if one goes on a tour or takes an excursion.  Our kids took a bike tour and then hiked in the forest.  We walked around town, visited the local Chamber of Commerce, stopped in the brewery and visited a distillery.  All was a lot of fun.

On Thursday we stopped in Juneau, Alaska’s capital city.  It’s nestled on the banks of the Gastineau Channel in the Inside Passage and surrounded by mountain peaks as high as 4,800 feet.  It is the only U.S. Capital bordered by a foreign country.  We left the Noordam to, once again, be confronted with rain and wind.

Downtown Juneau is a nice and compact.  The area around the pier is reminiscent of what I would expect turn of the 20th century Alaska to look like.  We visited the Red Dog Saloon, a place where Wyatt Earp once stopped.  We had a marvelous lunch of Alaskan king crab at Tracy’s King’ Crab Shack.  The crab was as good as the crab we had in Bergen, Norway.  We visited the Cathedral of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, a simple but lovely place of worship.  We stopped for a beer at a local brewery and generally had a fun time in the rain in Juneau.

Today, we are in Ketchikan.  More about Ketchikan later.  Pictures and more details when internet service allows.  Keep tuned.