The Alaskan Sealife Center

The Alaskan Sealife Center was set up with money from Exxon as part of the Exxon Valdez settlement. It is a great collection of birds, mammals. and invertebrates. (not many Herptiles in Alaska!)

We took the special "Puffin Adventure" tour, which gave us a chance to feed the puffins, pigeon guillemots, common murres and more.

Horned Puffin:

Tufted Puffin:

Common Murre:

Pigeon Guillemot:

 Doreen feeding a horned puffin:

Trying to feed the Murres

They were picky.

That is a red legged kittiwake on the left. They are very rare. The black legged kittiwakes are very common.

They also had fish:

 Steller Seal Lions:

 and Harbor Seals;

but we didn't feed any of them.

Time well spent.

Other Seward Expeditions - Exit Glacier

We had a few other interesting times in Seward. I have posted photos here, here, and here.

The hike up Exit Glacier was a lot of fun, easy, and close to Seward. Plus, we saw our first moose very up close and personal:

She is really in there, I promise. It was interesting because there are a lot of people who walk these trails. We didn't see any calves, but I would not have been surprised had they been in the underbrush.

As with many glaciers in the country, it is receding. It has been receding for over 100 years, and I cannot attest (because I do not know) if it is receding faster now than earlier.

But you do get a nice view of an outwash plane.

While you cannot walk up to and touch the glacier (as you could until a couple of years ago) you can get pretty close:

It was very cold and windy.

We could also see things that I learned about in High School and College about glaciers (erratic boulders and glacial striations) which I enjoyed:

The Steller Sunrise Part Two, Whales!

Some of you may be wondering if I don't know how to spell "Stellar" and I am here to tell you that I do. The Steller Sunrise is named after Georg Steller, and German Natural Scientist from the 18th century who was responsible for many significant discoveries in Alaska and in Russia. He was treated very poorly by those rotten Russians. Read the book Where the Sea Breaks Its Back for more information.

About halfway through the trip, as we were leaving the Holgate Glacier, we started seeing Whales.

At first we just saw a humpback feeding:

yes, that is a humpback.

and while we were all happy to see it, nobody got that excited.

Then, one of the passengers started running to the front of the boat (by this time we had taken refuge in the back) and was shouting, "Breaching whale!"

We all ran up, and the skipper pointed us in the right direction.

Soon we all saw this:

 Then this:

And this:

 and this:

and finally this:

and this:

 and this:

Just fantastic!

He signed off with a fluke wave:

and left. (I think my photo is too fuzzy to identify which whale this is)

We saw two more humpbacks breach, and one of them put his tail up and slapped the water at least a dozen times:

Not much to top that.

But we did see a fishing boat being chased by Black Legged Kittiwakes and Glaucous Winged Gulls on the way home:

and some happy fishermen on the dock:

It was a heck of a day.

The Steller Sunrise Part One. No Whales Here

One of the trips I was most looking forward to, as well as dreading a bit, was the small boat wildlife viewing trip on the Steller Sunrise, a vessel that carries about 10 passengers into Resurrection Bay, the Gulf of Alaska, and up into the fjords of the south Alaska coast to look at glaciers. I was excited about it because of the potential for seeing whales, porpoises, birds, sea lions, and seals. I was worried because it was an eight hour trip, and I didn't want to get sea sick.

We got the little "button" wrist bands, and whether they were the reason or not, I am happy to say that neither Doreen nor I got even a little squeamish on the ride.

And what a fantastic ride it was!

It was about 100 miles (Seward at the top) and we just really enjoyed the trip.

Well, it was cold.

partly because we chose to be at the front of the boat during the whole outgoing trip. We wanted to have the best view:

and we did. We were also the first to see the Dall Porpoises

(from the Hooper Museum. The only image not my own)

that look sort of like little Orcas, or Killer Whales.

We rode by some wonderful bird nesting islands (one called The Beehive, as the birds look like bees circling above)

where we saw Puffins (both Horned and tufted), Kittiwakes (only Black-Legged), Murres (common), Sooty Petrals, Pigeon Guillemots, and more.

And as we got farther along, we also saw Orcas:

 which the skipper said were from the resident, not the transient pods. I am not sure how they could tell, but they did say that the resident pods feed mainly on fish, the transient on sea mammals. And the two pods never mix.

At one point you could almost reach out to touch them.

We also saw Harbor Seals sleeping on rocks in the bay:

and Steller Sea Lions as well:

All these tours stop by the Holgate Glacier as about the half way point. (The boat provided sandwiches, per se, for lunch)

The Holgate Glacier is fed from the Harding Ice Field, the largest remaining ice mass in North America.

If you look in the water, you see little chunks of the glacier. The crew would fish them out and use them to cool down drinks:

Sandwiches, "per se"

We didn't stay in too many hotels on this trip, which gave us some flexibility as to eating. But here in Seward we needed to eat every meal out.

So one day at lunch, we just wanted a simple sandwich, so we asked at the front desk if there was anyplace they could recommend.

The hotel manager, a woman in her 60s with long, flowing gray hair (an ex-hippy. Maybe not so "ex") hemmed and hawed a bit, and then let us know:

"Well, in Seward, we don't really eat sandwiches per se"

What? You don't eat sandwiches per se?

So how do you eat them? Deconstructed? You get bread, meat, and cheese, but first take a bite of the bread, maybe a little spoon of mustard, followed by a nibble on the cheese? Maybe you eat a bit of meatloaf, followed by a tomato and then some lettuce?

In Seward, they don't eat sandwiched per se.

As such.

Seward

Seward is a tiny town that caters to cruise ships, tourists, and has a coal loading facility. It was almost completely wiped out in the 1964 Good Friday Earthquake, where there was not only a 9.5 quake, but a 45 foot tsunami as well. Luckily, as it was Good Friday, not many people were hurt. But the low lying town was severely damaged.

Seward is the start of the Ididarod Trail. Not the race, which goes from Fairbanks to Nome, but the trail itself that was used to supply the gold stampeders and the rest of Alaska for a while (as the railroad had some sever financial problems.

 They had some ravens in town (or are they crows?) which are fun to watch

and Resurrection Bay is beautiful:

The Salmon were still running:

and the beach was rocky.

 Here is our hotel. you can see Doreen in the window if you look closely: