Day Two, Sunday, August 1
Didn't sleep a lot, but probably dozed some. Normally, that stresses me, but for some reason it didn't bother me much. I didn't have that tired, loggy feeling you get when you've been tossing and turning all night. Ed got up early and left, and I tried to sleep some more, but gave up about 6:30 and got up and took a shower in the tiny little room. As instructed, I set the water temperature, wet myself and then turned off the water, soaped myself then rinsed off. It worked okay, except that I forgot to close the little curtain that protected the toilet area. Didn't seem necessary until I realized I had effectively doused the toilet paper. Oh well.
Went out to the bow of the ship where about twenty people had gathered. The ship was almost still, hovering at the end of an inlet and you could see whale spouts springing up all around. I grabbed my camera and binoculars and spent the next hour watching humpback whales in the dawn light. One of them actually breached fairly near the boat. Of course, I couldn't react in time to get a picture, but it was just wondrous. These ancient, prehistoric creatures feeding on the plankton that was rich in these waters, where several currents ran together. The mountainous islands nearby with rich, emerald green foliage, sometimes striped with a long, gray/brown scar that an avalanche had recently left behind. In the further distance were blue/white, snowcapped peaks. They seemed slightly disembodied from the earth, like a vision or a dream.
The naturalists (three or four of them) came out and sat with us, talking about how whales feed and why they were there, how and where they migrated, how they socialized, the differences among the various species. They seemed as excited and thrilled as the rest of us when one of the large humpbacks suddenly came up right in front of the boat, blowing a smelly spume all over us.
After breakfast, the ship left that area heading south and for the next four hours or so, I sat with others and with the naturalists near the bow, watching for and naming birds, spotting doll dolphins, by their rooster-tail spumes of water they left as a wake, and looking for various kinds of birds. It was almost meditative, utterly removed from anything else in the world.
By about 2 pm we reached a lagoon and the passengers were taken onto land in zodiac boats. Groups were divided into 'intrepid' walkers, with the expectation that the trail would be challenging and they would be walking for about two and a half hours. More people opted for that group than I expected. The group is extremely varied as to age. Most are probably at or close to retirement, early to mid-sixties. But there are a few closer to my age, and several that are relatively young, probably late twenties or early thirties.
I chose the intermediate group because I had never tried to hike in the big, awkward rubber boots we had purchased as a requirement of the trip before and wasn't sure how comfortable I would be. The naturalists told us we really should ‘bond with our boots’ since we would be spending a lot of time in them. They also said that the extraordinarily clear weather was unusual, and that we would go out whatever the temperature or weather, and it was usually cold and rainy. As it turned out, the boots were fine, and I probably should have taken the more challenging route. The forest was spectacular, complete with a roaring cascade of water that sent mist across the trail, slicking the rocks and spattering glasses.
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Skunk cabbage, hemlock, Sitka spruce, Devil's Club, Dwarf Dogwood, mosses, ferns, blueberries, elderberries, a riot of a rain forest in green and gray and red, all with a cloudless blue sky above to frame it. Remarkable.
A View of the Seabird from the Hiking Trail
At dinner, we talked with Kay and Hattie, two Quaker ladies from Vermont, both widows. They are just lovely and along with another tablemate, Fred from Boston (risk consultant), had a lively conversation. They described some of the various factions within the Quaker church, as well as a six-week tour of Europe they had taken together. I wish I were so well traveled.
After dinner, the ship headed towards Scenery Cove, a small inlet near a glacier whose name I will have to look up later. It was cool in the twilight, the water like glass, and as the sun set, the top of the mountains around us turned pink, then almost violet. As we rounded the curve towards Scenic Cove, the wind off of the glacier struck, and the temperature dropped 20 degrees in a span of seconds. I scurried in to get my heavy coat, and then sat in the bow of the ship watching as the captain turned a tight corner and went into this tiny inlet, surrounded by steep forest and rock walls, and towering mountainsides. There was a small yacht anchored there and I'm sure we were a surprise to them. Inside the cove was sheltered from the wind and it was beautiful and quite comfortable. We all watched as the sun set, then it was close to ten o'clock when the captain turned the ship around on a dime and we headed back out. As the glacier wind hit again, I decided it was time to turn in.
