Life On Water: Canoe-ing Glacier Bay

I went on an awesome canoe trip in Glacier Bay.

It took a lot of work to get everything set up, but I borrowed a canoe from one of my fellow guides here at Uncruise,

and he lives in Juneau, so I got it a while back, put it on the ship, and then offloaded it at Bartlett Cove, where the headquarters of the park are.

Then I slowly put some things into the canoe to get it ready, like Life Jackets, Bear Spray and some waterproof things. Then I had a break back in Bellingham and then flew up to Glacier Bay with my brother Abe, and my friend Danny, and we grabbed the things and set off on an epic journey.

First we had to get a ride up bay, and we hitched a ride with the wonderful Uncruise boat, the SS Legacy, captained by Tim Voss. He picked us up at Bartlett Cove and took us all the way up to John's Hopkins Glacier, where we paddled around the face and enjoyed ourselves a lot. On the way up we saw some Bears

and some Mountain Goats,

as well as some Horned Puffins.

And some Seals.

Here's a shot of the Legacy in front of the glacier.

We got into the canoe and paddled around to look,

and found a spot to hike around overlooking the side.

There is a lot of Dryas around and that is beautiful to see also.

We found some calving happening and it was impressive.

Then we paddled around to look closer, and found some seals on the icebergs

and took a close look at the corners of the glacier. It is not a happy glacier right now, it is sitting heavily on its moraine and looks to be beginning to retreat.

Then we went to the camping site, which is called Chocolate Falls, named after the waterfall that is full of sediment.

Here's a shot of us from near our camp site.

The next morning we paddled along the inlet (towards the outlet) and found some waterfalls coming down the cliffs,

and an oystercatcher, who was ok with us taking a close look.

We explored Topeka Glacier, but after finding it to be less exciting than we had hoped, we paddled over to Lamplugh Glacier, which I think is the gem of the park right now.

It is in a sad way, falling apart, but utterly beautiful in demise. We ended up camping right along the front of the glacier, on top of a pile of moraine material that had been pushed up by some ice.

It was the most exciting place to camp and we loved it.

The ice that calved spilled into a lake of water that sloshed tidal waves around us, but we were high enough to escape dry, though the booming sound kept us awake all night in wonder and awe. I took a few night shots as well.

The next morning we explored the ridge above Lamplugh and found some Ptarmigans walking the beach,

and an unknown finch

and a marmot!

and looking down at the ice the seracs are very beautiful

Here is another unknown yellow bird.

And a shot overlooking the side of Lamplugh

The tide dropped and we walked around the ice garden

and approached the face

and more ice garden

We had Oystercatchers the whole time, they are very commonly found in Glacier Bay, and when we went to Reid Glacier, after a long day and night exploring Lamplugh, we found some more. They guarded our campsite and in the wee hours of the night let us know that a ptarmigan was invading by shrilly shrieking out into the silence. Awww, how nice.

We camped near the Ibach cabin site, on the west side of the old terminal moraine at the entrance to Reid Inlet. There is a good view of the glacier from there, though it is about a mile away, and the katabatic winds (that are cold) blow down gently and constantly, so it was possibly our coldest camping spot. So we used the fly on the tent, which made us very warm. It didn't rain on the entire trip and that was the only night that I put up the rain fly, and it was just for the wind.

We found lots of strawberries, so we ate them!

The next morning we found some Semipalmated Plovers exploring th‌e intertidal, as we explored the strawberry fields,

and a hummingbird did some trader joes shopping...

Then we paddled over to the glacier to have a closer look. I hadn't been to Reid for 10 years, and in that time it hasn't changed as much as the other glaciers in Glacier bay, but still it was different. We explored the front and found that it had backed away from the tide line (or extended the terminal moraine) by a bit, there is a lot of land in between the glacier and the water at low tide at least. We climbed up the left side and got higher than I've ever been before and then tromped around on top a little bit before heading back.

Where we found a Great Horned Owl!

Then as we were leaving, we found my friends on Laysan, and had dinner with them before paddling over to the next camp site in the growing dusk.

We camped at Scidmore Gap, which used to be under water, it is an old moraine, and there is a passage for kayaks (and canoes) at really high water, but we had to portage on our way. It wasn't the worst thing, and there were lots of birds along the way.

An Evening Grosbeak youngling, fluffed up.

and a Lesser Yellowlegs.

After the portage we lay in the burning sun for a while resting before going for another paddle, and we found some whales, who came right up to us and gave us a bit of a show!

And we found a little inlet that might be called Hugh Miller Inlet, and camped near the entrance. This was one of my favorite places.

The Hugh Miller Glacier comes down and the river that flows out from it is full of silt and it makes a braided river that we explored. Salmon were running up the stream and there wer lots of bear tracks, also wolf and moose as well.