What started as rain or snow perhaps a thousand years ago fell in a world cooler and wetter than today's Alaska. The snow was fallen upon by other snow, and slowly to us but quickly to the twin geologic forces of pressure and gravity, turned into ice. This ice made its way out of the mountains and towards the awaiting sea, taking any unwary rock and unprepared plant along with it as it scoured the floor of the glacial filled valley.
After winding a path to the ocean the ice was assaulted by its only enemy, warmth. This warmth came in the form of sea water, which does not want to freeze. Water that is bitterly cold to us is like a warm yet deadly blanket to the glacier. It quickly melted away the base of the glacier so as to undercut the 100-foot-tall face of the tongue of ice.
Having nowhere to go but down into the water, the ice toppled over, cascading down in chunks ranging from baseball-sized to larger than buildings. This ice then spent days or weeks being attacked by the warmth of the ocean as it became smaller and smaller. The tide moved the ice out of the fjord and into the channel where we are fretting our hour upon the geologic stage of life. We cruised among the great and small stages of ice and wondered at them all... wondered about the day the snow fell so long ago.
Jason Kelley, Naturalist; photo by Neil Folsom
An exceptional sighting: we were scanning for anything of interest up near Misty Fjords and those at the bow scored a swimming bear going across the channel. When he got out of the water it was the skinniest darn bear that I ever saw. Our bear was a wolf! He acknowledged our presence and posed a few times before heading back into the woods. Their tongues are a bright pink!
