Pond Island and Peril Strait
Early in the morning the National Geographic Sea Lion made her way towards the protection of Pond Island located in the beautiful Kelp Bay on the eastern side of Baranof Island. The small Pond Island is so named after a family of beavers that created a small reservoir. After breakfast we landed on the island and went to explore the forest and pond. We found chipped wood and a well-engineered dam, signs of the largest rodents in North America, beavers. All surrounded by magnificent Sitka spruce, the state tree of Alaska, Western hemlock, Salmonberry and many other plant species.
We also had the chance to get a close look at some of the abundant marine creatures left behind by the receding tide, particularly the blue mussels. Blue mussels are mollusks that filter the waters to capture tiny microscopic prey; as such, every once in a while they eat planktonic dinoflagellates that produce toxins, including domoic acid, and accumulate it within their own tissues. That is why native people like the Tlingit stop eating mussels and other filter-feeding mollusks from May to September, when chances of seafood poisoning are higher. However, sometimes people eat mussels during the wrong time out of necessity and tragedies happen, as was the case in 1799 when a large group of Aleut sea otter hunters working in this very same area died after eating blue mussels. Since then, the channel that we sailed through during the afternoon between Baranof and Chichagof islands is known as Peril Strait.
We eventually poked our bow into Saook Bay on Baranof Island, where a magnificent brown bear slowly searched for food along the shore. The solitary bear, small against the immensity of the landscape reminded us of the work of one of the world’s arguably best nature photographers Michio Hoshino, who loved and knew Alaska like few people. After dinner, a couple of humpback whales made for the perfect ending of a great trip in the Great State.
