This was the first Prince William Sound trip for me, but I'll get a few more later on. We had a few days of rain, but also some sun, and the snow was glistening around on the peaks. Seward is beautiful, and it was nice when we were leaving.
When we went to Tiger Glacier, we spotted a Black Bear climbing across the glacier, which was amazing. I hope it made it back all right.
Another view of the crevasses of Tiger Glacier
Then on the first evening, we had a bunch of humpback whales bubblenetting! In the past it was tricky to find them, but this week they were out in force.
They came up a few times pretty close.
The next day we found either the same group or another group, and this time we had the hydrophone out to listen to the call, and that was really cool.
That evening we did a skiff tour up a river and found a Brown Bear and cubs
and a few Merganser ducklings swimming up the river
Then I did a skiff tour and found a few humpbacks out and about lunge feeding.
They were moving all over the place and came quite close a few times.
Here you can see the tubercles on the snout
Usually in pairs, lunging together. Here you can see the water coming out of the side of the mouth. They lunge and get a big mouthful of water and then it strains out over the side of the mouth.
At one point they came right at the skiff and went under it. this is the front view of the nose
We went to Meares Glacier and it had advanced a bit since last year. Its killing trees and running them over.
We found a small whale that eventually we identified as a Minke whale, but at first it was porpoiseing, which is like half jumping out, and making a big splash, but moving very fast. We couldn't figure out the species for a long time, but in this photo you can see the two blow holes, so its not a dolphin or toothed whale.
We did our second Aleutian Islands trip, and it was a nice time. We started off in Dutch Harbor and found a nice little Arctic Ground Squirrel there.
And the willows are starting to bud out now. Everything is turning green now.
We went looking around the northern end of Unalaska Island, and found some really cool caves along there. I'd like to explore around there more in the future.
On Akutan island we found a fish that washed up, it was about 6 ft long and had tons of big teeth, and its called a Lancetfish
A little further on we found some Caribou, and they came walking along the mountain and got pretty close
One of them was a male with big antlers
Here he is on the hill watching us
On a hike elsewhere I found some Rock Sandpipers
And a surfbird that let us get really close in a skiff
In Katmai we had great bears, of course. One was digging up small fish in the intertidal zone
A red fox was also doing that
The bear later on was munching on grass
And we had some nesting Cormorants up in the rocks there too.
We found lots of orca, maybe a pod of 100 or so
And then at Kodiak we found more foxes, eating the same fish in the sand. The fish are called Sand Lance
This little fox let us sit down on the beach and came pretty close to us
Chomping on those fish
Occasionally she would go and hide the fish somewhere and then come back for more
I also spotted some Parakeet Auklets
They are super cute
This is the first time I've seen them
Dancing and singing to each other
The final day we went to Kenai and had a great time at the Northwestern Glacier
Here's a video of a fox digging up a sand lance
And one of the glacier doing a super cool calving, where it comes down as an avalanche
I've left my boat in Mexico, and made it back up to Alaska. I had a week in Bellingham along the way, but then flew up to Anchorage and took a car down to the Safari Explorer in Seward, and off we went! We did an "Aleutian Islands" trip, so Seward to Kenai Fjords, then to Kodiak. At Kodiak we found some nice foxes
I love the intensity of the eyes.
And nesting Arctic Terns
Then we headed over to Katmai, and found some bears.
and then on to Kijulik Bay, where I saw this little Arctic Ground Squirrel...
And then on to the Shumigan Islands, to Unga Island, where I had a skiff tour with some Orcas, and the Pavlof Volcano in the background.
There's also this Palm tree kelp along the rocks there.
Later on in the evening, we were cruising along towards the Pavlof Volcano and found some Fin Whales.
We dropped some skiffs and I did a fun little skiff tour with a few Fin Whales. They are quite big. They are second only to the Blue Whale in size. This one might have been 80 ft long.
Then we went to Volcano Bay, and it was very calm and we got more looks at the Pavlof Volcano. I did a kayak and a little walk around in the intertidal area of a river mouth.
Another view of the reflection
Jeremy also did a beach walk
There was a small bird lurking around and I think it was a dunlin, and it was watching me, and then crouched down.
A little further on we came across the Shashaldin volcano, which is lightly erupting
Then we got to Akutan Island and I found a sea otter and pup in the kelp there.
And nesting Arctic Terns
