Alaska - Day 5

On the morning of the fifth day something unusual happened: Erin and I were the first out of our tents. We'd woken to the sound of rain outside, and inside, our tent. The rain had started early in the morning and by about 8am it was dripping through the tent onto my sleeping bag and sleeping pad. Apparently this had been observed by Erin for some time before it came to my attention. Anyway, I hastily got my sleeping bag and sleeping pad out of the way before they got any wetter.

After we put on our rain gear and exited the tent I began working to start a fire, which was especially challenging this morning with the additional humidity and extra wet wood. After seeing how slowly the wood was catching, I decided a fire-starter was in order to speed things up. With a somewhat smoky fire started, we spent most of the morning at camp sitting out the rain. We also decided not to move camp on this day, and instead planed on spending another night in the same spot. This was in part due to the rain and in part because it would also give us an opportunity to explore Yale glacier, before heading over to Harvard glacier on the following day.

By the afternoon the rain had cleared and it seemed like some blue sky might even make an appearance. After lunch we left camp and set-off in the direction of Yale. We noticed a lot of seagull activity a short way into the paddle, we couldn’t work out what all the fuss was about, but it could have been due to some dolphins that we saw in the distance.

As we paddled towards Yale glacier, we approached a long skinny island which could have been a medial moraine (rock formed in the middle of two glacier flows). The island is now home to many seagulls and there was a lot of squawking as we approached the rookery. At about this point, we also noticed a strange line in the water. The line went from the end of the island to the shore. It appeared to be a division between the cold water flowing slowly around one side of the island and colder water running around the other, anyway it was strange.

It’s also worth noting that at this point we were entering uncharted territory. The maps we had with us (and also Google Maps) shows the right-hand side of the glacier face extending out just past the end of the long skinny island. In actual fact, the glacier face has receded several miles since the USGS survey from which most of the maps are based. You can see the difference by comparing the “Map” view with the more recent “Satellite” view in Google Maps. It was quite incredible to be in a location that had changed so much from (relatively) recent maps we had in hand. You would be forgiven for thinking the map and location where not the same. Add to that the fact that my GPS also thought we where padding on land, and it was all a bit confusing.

Another geographical aspect that we found interesting in this area was how the flow rate of the water was different between the right-hand of the island (that we were on) and the left-hand side of the island. I can only speculate that the glacier had formed deeper channel on the other side, and the change in features would somewhat support that.

We paddled the length of the long skinny island and found ourselves in a field of ice chunks. It became more difficult to maneuver our boats without hitting them, even though we’d slowed down to an idle float. This was the most ice we’d seen so far on the trip. The sound you hear when the hollow fiberglass boat you’re sitting in collides with one of these big, heavy and sharp frozen lumps is not very peasant. The sound varies depending on how you hit them – sometimes it’s a thud, bump, or crack, and other times they make an unpleasant gouging sound. I was starting to have titanic thoughts and after a few bumps. I had to make sure my feet weren’t starting to feel wet from the icy cold water. I was also convincing myself that since my boat was made up of three separate compartments, I’d probably be able to make it to shore – fortunately it didn’t come to that, and my feet stayed dry.

We stopped paddling towards the face of Yale glacier at a point where we were still about 2 miles away. It was close enough for us as you really don’t want to get too close to glaciers in tippy little boats. After admiring the view for sometime (I could have stayed there for hours), we turned around and headed towards short for a break by a river. We turned around instead of circumnavigating the long skinny island because the faster flowing water on the other side made it too dangerous with all the chunks of ice.

The paddle from Yale glacier back to camp was amazing. It was one of the best parts of the trip for me and is certainly an experience that I hope I’ll never forget. It started off as a relaxed paddle into the middle of the bay, and then over to get a closer look at some otters resting on the icebergs. Then the sun came out and I had blue sky above, with mountains all around. I was just slowly floating along in my boat, soaking it all in. As if by magic, the ice was soon all around me. As the tide turned I became surrounded by it. The only sound I could hear was that cracking, popping, and occasional ripples made by the ice. It was unbelievable. And wow, it was perfect.

Strangely it was about 7pm at this point although it felt like 2pm as the sun was still high in the middle of the sky. We regrouped near and iceberg that had several otters laying on it. They were too busy snoozing in the sun to notice our approach. We got pretty close before all of a sudden, all at once, they slid off the ice and disappeared into the water below. It was quite a show.

On arriving back at camp, Erin and I walked to the near-by river to collect and filter water. We then enjoyed the sunset from our campsite on the beach where we had the view of the mountains and glaciers across the fjord. We noticed the clouds turning pink above Yale glacier as we enjoyed the most delicious pea soup I’ve ever tasted. As it got dark we sat be the fire and drank hot-chocolate supplemented with quality biscuits. Sometime shortly after midnight we turned in for the night and I promptly fell asleep. It had been a fantastic day.

At this point we were more than half way though our trip. I took a lot of photos on this day. You can see a selection of some of my favorite photos from Day 5, on Flickr..

Here's a map showing our location and paddling track for Day 5. It's best viewed in Google Earth or directly in Google Maps (link opens in a new window).