Day 20 May 9th Ketchikan

Our excursion catamaran

As we were getting up today

The Zaandam

the boat was arriving in Ketchikan (look it up on Google maps!).  We had been told the weather would not be good but typical of this area.  Ketchikan is on the border of a rain forest and has 160" of rain a year.  So it was steady rain and feeling

our route

cooler (we are going north) as we peeked our noses into

bald eagle

the outside.  We breakfasted and had arranged to join a tour 0900 to go up some fjords and view the local scenery and wildlife for 41/2 hours on a boat.  

We put all our wet weather

bald eagle's nest

gear on and left the ship and soon found the St Nona

snow and mountains

our boat for the day.  As we pulled away from the dock we had a good view of the Zaandam.  As we got underway we were soon seeing wildlife through the rain and mist.  Apologies because some of the photos have raindrops on

waterfalls

the camera lens.  We saw bald eagles and their nests which can weigh up to a ton because they

harbour seals

use the same one each year and just add to it.  The rain was intermittent as we travelled along the route provided for us.  There were snow and mountains in the distance and nearby we saw dramatic waterfalls.

We had refreshment with hot

humpback beginning to dive

chocolate and doughnuts.  Later

humpback spouting

we saw more wildlife in the form of harbour seals, other bald eagles flying in the vicinity and then a humpback whale was spotted near our boat.  We stopped for quite a long time and several more

Us at Eddison Lighthouse rock

appeared - it was for us a very good experience and we were lucky enough to

bowl valley carved by glacier

get some photos.

We carried on and stopped at Eddison Lighthouse Rock - named by Royal Navy Captain George Vancouver  who thought it looked like the lighthouse at Plymouth, UK.  We saw

more spectacular waterfalls

some other rock formations carved by glaciers and

mist and waterfalls

more waterfalls which were in full flow because of the liquid sunshine.  The rain was still coming down but by this time the crew had fortified us with clam chowder which was excellent.  

As we made our way back to

Ketchikan

Ketchikan (the salmon

young bald eagle

capital of Alaska) we saw a young bald eagle on a pole.  We arrived back at the dock having gone beyond our allotted time due to stopping for whale watching.  We did a bit of souvenir shopping in the town before reboarding the Zaandam.  It had been a wonderful tour and the wildlife expert who guided us was surprised at the whale sightings which had made the trip.

The rest of the day was less spectacular.  We dried out, had a cup of tea then a time of relaxation and organisation before our evening meal.  If you are geared up for wet weather as we were it proved to be an excellent choice of tour.