I likely have mentioned it before, but JD, Kathy, Lee and I completed a trip through Alaska on Kawasaki 650 motorcycles, nine years ago. Back then, Kathy and I, and another friend Tammy, flew into Fairbanks to meet up with our husbands after their return from Deadhorse, on the North Slope of Alaska, on the Haul Road. Our group of three couples then rode south from Fairbanks toward Anchorage, stopping in Talkeetna, then out to Katmai National Park, and finally over to Haines, where we caught a ferry to Seattle. This time, we are following a similar route, in reverse – south to north. I appreciate the symbolism of this reversal; it affords many opportunities to reflect on my, and our (JD and my), growth these past nine years.

JD has had boats all of his life, having built a boat in shop class as a teenager, with his father, who was blind. JD grew up in south Jersey; he and his dad explored much of the Delaware River on that boat, which he owned until 1990. Our current fleet consists of 10 boats: an inflatable, 16-ft raft; a 16-foot Lund; a 12-foot fiberglass tag-along; two kayaks; two stand-up paddle-boards; one canoe; a 19-foot O’Day Mariner sailboat; and a Gregor Ocean 20 fishing boat – the Pelli. And not enough time to use any of them! But that doesn’t stop JD from identifying himself as The Harbormaster on his business/contact cards. And so, it should come as no surprise that, once he got the Pelli into the water up here in Alaska, he hasn’t been ready to take her back out.

So, we have been in Seward now approximately two weeks – and much of this time, rain or shine, JD (and Lee, and sometimes me) has been out fishing. The catching has been, well, more difficult – the silver salmon are further offshore than expected, and the same techniques we used in the Strait of Juan de Fuca aren’t landing us any fish here. For a competency-driven, goal-oriented person like JD, this is beyond disappointing. 

Courtesy of Fernando, JD and I did take a break for a fjords tour – bringing us into the lands and waters of Kenai Fjords National Park, and the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge. When our boat captain, “Captain Mark”, announced that we were entering these treasured lands, set aside for conservation, JD and my eyes went misty as we looked at each other. We both miss working on behalf of such special places, and noble causes.

Captain Mark was an exceptional narrator – weaving together his 29 years as a fjord tour boat captain with timely, interesting and animated facts about the wildlife, geology, and climate of the greater Resurrection Bay ecosystem. He is out on these waters nearly every day – and he effortlessly and respectfully guided us to see, hear, and learn about everything from pelagic birds, to marine mammals, to the changing climate of this glaciated land- and sea- scape.

We saw several species of alcid – a family of pelagic seabirds that is occasionally described as a northern counterpart of penguins, and includes tufted and horned puffins, rhinoceros auklets, common mures. We saw these birds at the Alaska Sea Life Center, but it was all the more glorious to see them out in the wild. According to Captain Mark, these seabirds are actually more hydrodynamic than aerodynamic, with dense bones, and able to dive to great depths. They have to work harder to fly than swim, and if they stop flapping, they fall out of the sky like a rock. Puffins can dive to 100 feet, mures can dive to 300.

We saw harbor seals and Stellar sea lions, some swimming solitary and others in groups, males often defending territories, rookeries of mothers and pups small enough to seeming to just be learning to rise up on their flippers and “walk”. We saw a mountain goat and her (very young) calf, precariously (it seemed to us humans) grazing on near-vertical cliffs.

As we approached Northwest Glacier and Captain Mark again cut the engines, we sat mesmerized listening to the glacier’s many sounds – creaking, groaning, dripping, gurgling and gushing into the sea, the aquamarine blue of the glacier accentuated by the overcast, rainy skies. After many moments of silence, he noted that fewer than 500,000 people have been here, tours to that particular glacier having only begun in the mid 1990s.

I particularly appreciated how the Captain spoke of his observations of glacial retreat over the course of his nearly 30 years of visiting these remnants of the Harding Icefield. As we approached the current end (terminus) of each glacier, he noted where it used to be, decades or even just years before. He never used the phrase “climate change”, but he made no effort to disguise his conviction that we are watching the end of these glaciers, in our lifetime. He didn’t overwhelm with facts and figures, but rather, with story – masterfully punctuating his words with silence, to allow them, and the scenery around us, to register.

Just as we were graced with the first sustained rays of sunshine of the day (and the week), we saw a pod of five or six fin whales, including one baby off the bow of our boat, surfacing for many breaths. Although JD and I were not standing together, we both spied the golden brown baby surfacing alongside its mother. I viewed the whales from the bow of the boat, riding the 4-5 foot seas on my knees, hand holding me steady on the rail. I had finally put our camera away for the day (it got too wet), which helped me to simply be present for their emergence, the graceful gift of their presence. After the fin whales, we were able to view two, possibly three, humpback whales – surfacing and then diving again, gracefully revealing their characteristic tail “flukes” as they descended back beneath the surface. As I sat on the bow, cycling through moments of longing for their return, and then gratitude for simply knowing they were near, and the ability to see them at all, I thought of my recent reading from an oracle card deck, inviting me to consider the meaning, and mystery, of whale song.

Finally, the whales descended back below the surface in a deep dive, and Captain Mark turned our boat back toward Seward Boat Harbor. As he did, a rainbow began to form off of our port side, where the mountains were just meeting the water. As we rode along side of it, the colors grew more and more brilliant, mirroring my feelings about the entire experience. How majestic, how wondrous. How lucky we are to be alive, to be able to see and experience such places. While they, and we, are still here.