Day 28 May 17th Hubbard Glacier and sea

Indonesian show cast 

We went to a guitar concert

MS Zaandam 1939

in the theatre last evening which was very good and after that there was a concert by some of the Indonesian members of the ship’s crew which again was excellent and gave a sample of their culture. Today dawned a much better day and we were grateful as we were hoping to

ship's bell on bow

visit Hubbard Glacier later

On the bow

and get some good views. The weather was calm and we had completed most of the crossing of the Bay of Alaska overnight The morning was leisurely as we were not due to get to the glacier until 1500. We breakfasted and then read for a while before getting some exercise by walking 4 laps round deck 3. The scenery was improving as we entered Yakutat Bay and the bow was opened so that we could get some photos there. On the way back to the cabin we took a picture of a former MS Zaandam in 1939 at Cawsand Bay (near Plymouth).

glacier from distance

We lunched and about that

nearer the glacier

time the ship picked up the local pilot. The mountains were now dominating the shoreline and we also saw several whales appearing but no photos this time. Soon we could see the glacier in the distance and the ship slowed considerably as we approached to prevent a

Hubbard glacier face

wash disturbing the marine and shoreline ecologies. We

blue ice iceberg from glacier

watched from our verandah for most of the time and then went to the deck and bow as the ship began to slowly turn round quite close to the face of the glacier. It was all very expertly done and we were able to take some close up photos and videos.   One video shows the face of the glacier and the other one is taken further back showing reflections in the still water.

Soon we were on our return journey out of the bay and heading for the Bay of Alaska.

We returned to our verandah, saw some pretty small icebergs which were blue tinged from the glacier and looked out for other wildlife but with no success. We are further north than Endicott Arm glacier and the vegetation is nowhere near as lush and so that could explain the lack of bears, moose etc. We continued the slow journey until we got to the end of Yakutat and are now heading towards Sitka. This evening we have dinner and a show with the backdrop of BBC’s Alaska Earth programme.