Seward, Glaciers, Valdez

August 13-19, 2013

We have been out on the water several times lately from Halibut fishing in Homer, then a three hour dinner cruise in Seward, to a nine hour boat tour of the Prince William Sound to see wildlife and glaciers.  You would have thought we would have seen a whale or two by now--no such luck.  We have seen Stellar Sea Lions, Harbor Seals, Dall Porpoise, sea otters, salmon, sea birds like Puffins, and Eagles.  Guess we shouldn't complain.

Can't complain about not seeing much of a glacier in Glacier National Park now that we have seen glaciers on foot, from the air, and from the sea.  Saw icebergs a plenty today.  We have no clue how many glaciers we have seen.  They seem to be everywhere in this area.

In Seward, we had signed up for an optional activity of visiting an Iditarod Champion's Kennel (Mitch Seavey and son Dallas Seavey) .  Chuck has come down with the cold that has been traveling through the caravan and didn't feel like going.  PJ went with the wagonmaster's wife and enjoyed the tour.  These dogs love to run and get so excited when they are getting connected to a sled or in this case a cart.  We were able to go on a two mile ride with 16 dogs pulling 9 people effortlessly in the cart.  Being in the low 50's, it was a little warm for these dogs who like to run in the below freezing temperatures.  They were stopped and rested during the run because of the "heat".  We were able to hold some 3-day old puppies since they begin socializing the puppies almost immediately.  Alaskan Huskies have been bred from several breeds of dogs and are mostly bred for endurance.  While some of them do have blue eyes, most of them do not look anything like a Siberian Husky. 

After I returned from seeing the dogs, Chuck was feeling good enough to take a flight over the glaciers and the Harding Ice Fields.  The planes are getting smaller; this plane was a 4-seater Cessna.  Like so many people we have met up here, the pilot came up on vacation one year and never left. Will let the pictures tell the glacier story.

Exit Glacier by foot--yes we went all the way to it



Stellar Sea Lions seen during dinner cruise

Dog Team -- PJ in cart

Harding Ice Field--glaciers flow out of ice fields

Exit Glacier by air--we were at the bottom when hiking

Chuck, Phil, and the pilot

Horsetail Falls

Sea Otters playing

Iceberg from Columbia Glacier--saw it turn over

Us at Meares Glacier

Meares Glacier

Harbor Seals on iceberg from Meares Glacier



Oil pipeline terminus in Valdez


Happy tomorrow is a free day!