Happy Thursday! I am excited to share the next installment of our Alaskan cruise. We started our trip on June 26th with a loooooong flight to Anchorage and I shared the first two days with you last week. Today I am sharing our day at sea in Glacier Bay National Park. When I first saw our itinerary, I was a little unsure about two days at sea in a row. I was so wrong! Glacier Bay National Park was so incredible!
While we were eating breakfast, my mom spotted some sea otters! She was our first otter spotter! We saw a ton throughout the day playing and floating with a baby on the chest.
Our time in the park started when the park rangers boarded our ship and hosted a talk about the park. We caught a portion of the talk and it was very informative. They had a pad of papers that you could stamp to add to your National Park collection.
They had a National Park shop on the ship and I picked up our family’s standard souveniers – a magnet and a Christmas ornament. The ship also provided a map and brochure of the national park in everyone’s room.
Then we headed outside for the park. One park ranger was in the bridge all day and narrated everything we saw. The first animal she announced was a mountain goat. Jeff was on a different deck with my mom and Jack and texted me, “Did you get a picture of the goat?” Of course, I did! 😉
Here are the actual goats.
As we sailed into the park, our first glacier of the day was Reid glacier.
The water and mountains were absolutely beautiful! The water looked like Caribbean water with ice berglets floating in it. The mountains looked like painted scenery. We had incredible weather all day. It was chilly enough for hats, gloves, lightweight puffer jackets, and warm blankets, but the sun was lovely. They passed out chicken broth and hot chocolate all day. It was perfect!
Our next glacier was Margerie Glacier. She was gorgeous, too!! I saw this glacier calve, but didn’t catch it on video. It was a small calving but still incredible!
The next glacier looks like a mountian of dirt, but it’s a glacier and the face of it was so big! This is the Grand Pacific Glacier and extends into Canada.
Mom and I had to take a selfie off the back. The nine of us were all over the ship throughout the day. I had a very hard time sitting down or going inside because I didn’t want to miss anything! We saw more bald eagles, and found this one sitting on a piece of ice. We also spotted a bear on the shore!
Next we sailed by the Lamplugh Glacier. We thought this would be our last glacier, but the captain surprised us. Apparently, our captain had a special certification and was an ice captain. He recently sailed to/near Antarctica and had a lot of experience sailing big ships into and near ice.
He was able to take us past Jaw Point to see the Johns Hopkins Glacier. We were not expecting that and it was a great treat. Johns Hopkins Glacier was beautiful!
After the last glacier, we started heading back to our rooms for a little rest. We had four rooms in a row so we could chat on our balconies. Someone spotted seals out on some ice and called to the rest of us. We saw a ton of seals playing and laying on the ice. What fun! I was ready for some exercise so I headed up to the track. There was a lovely fitness center, but I didn’t want to be trapped inside. While I was walking, we spotted three whales swimming along!
Dinner was a “formal” night so we dressed it up a little more. We celebrated my parent’s 50th anniversary that night. Their actual anniversary is soon, but we were all together and dressed up so we celebrated! We had an early morning the next day with a 6:15 am kayaking excursion so we headed to bed a little early.
Glacier Bay National Park was a gorgeous day! If you are booking an Alaskan cruise, make sure this is on your itinerary. I believe they only let two ships in a day to preserve the park, so every ship doesn’t go. Our ship turned off all music, shows, and anything that would be loud and disturb the wildlife in the park. The ship did not use anything that could possibly end up in the water when we were in the park – no straws, no paper napkins, nothing disposable. It was very clear that preserving the animals and landscapes in the park were the most important thing!
For your reference, we were on the Discovery Princess and our itinerary for the trip was:
Saturday 6/27 – board the ship in Whittier, AK
Sunday 6/28 – day at sea, Hubbard Glacier
Monday 6/29 – day at sea, Glacier Bay National Park
Tuesday 6/30 – Icy Straight Point/Hoonah
Wednesday 7/1 – Juneau
Thursday 7/2 – Ketchikan
Friday 7/3 – day at sea
Saturday 7/4 – disembark in Vancouver
Sunday 7/5 – Vancouver and red eye home
I’ll be back soon to share another day or two with you. Have a great day full of sunshine and books!
