Pond Island and Chatham Strait
One of the things that make Southeast Alaska one of the most special places in the world is of course its wild spirit and its wildlife. Early this morning, as we sailed through Kelp Bay, we spotted a sow brown bear with her two cubs. They were feeding near a small salmon spawning stream at the edge of the bay. A few minutes later, a second sow with two cubs, much smaller than the first ones came out of the forest. We observed six bears, surrounded by majestic scenery. All of this happened just before breakfast!
Our morning’s destination was Pond Island, an ideal place to explore the temperate rain forest, and to kayak around its scenic shoreline. To make things even better, the weather today was as good as it gets. Beautiful clouds covered the sky and they would later vanish to expose the blue to allow the sunshine in.
We explored Pond Island by foot on different length walks. This forest, which turns into a beautiful muskeg is full of interesting things that make it different from the rest of the places we visit. Alaska yellow cedars dominate this forest, and a mirror-like pond with yellow pond lilies and cotton grass became a real treat to end our walk through the woods
Our afternoon was spent sailing through Chatham Strait. After some time of scanning the horizon, we started spotting different whale blows along the horizon. One group of humpback whales seemed particularly interesting. We slowly made an approach, and we noticed that there was a group of four humpbacks that traveled together and occasionally took a dive to feed. At one point, the whales seemed to approach us slowly. Our ship stopped to wait and see what the whale’s next move was going to be. Suddenly, the whales surfaced very close to us. As the ship stood still on the water’s surface, the four humpbacks kept emerging in the close proximity. Sightings of whales like this one are a matter of good fortune, and today was our lucky day. Every time the whales surfaced we could see every detail of their rostrum and their blowholes.
This spectacle of nature continued throughout the afternoon and into the evening hours. There is no doubt that Southeast Alaska is the best place to make wildlife experiences like this one possible.
