Pour the bubbly, and light the candles, it’s time to celebrate. But it’s not a birthday, rather it’s an anniversary. Fifty years ago Congress passed a landmark legislation called the Wilderness Act. It confers the highest level of protection for public lands. As you might guess, wilderness areas offer outstanding opportunities for solitude, recreation, fresh air, clean water, and intact ecosystems. In short, places where nature is “still in charge” according to our eloquent National Park Service Ranger Amy. And the National Geographic Sea Bird was definitely at the mercy of Mother Nature as we entered Glacier Bay National Park fighting a strong tidal current due to a “super moon.”
More than 80% of Glacier Bay is designated wilderness and it was those areas that gave us great wildlife viewing today. At Marble Island, a bird sanctuary, we enjoyed wonderful views of sea lions, puffins, and eagles to name a few. Not long after we had the privilege of watching not one, not two, but three brown bears foraging in the intertidal zone by turning over rocks and feeding on the small fish hidden below. Though fog was a constant companion on our trip up the bay, it magically lifted after lunch to give us fantastic views of Margerie Glacier and the highest peaks of the Fairweather Range.
On the down-bay trip we retraced our steps back to a gray and foreboding rock locally known as “Gloomy Knob” but more appropriately named Janwu.aani. Our Cultural Interpreter Bertha explained that the Tlingit name means “mountain goat land,” where we had delightfully close views of these sure-footed animals. She described how the fur was gathered and used to create the highly prized and culturally significant Chilkat blankets. The tides, now in our favor, carried us swiftly back to Bartlett Cove where we enjoyed a bit of walking before our sunset departure.
A Pulitzer-prize winning author and ardent conservationist Wallace Stegner, once referred to wilderness lands as a “geography of hope.” He wrote a moving preamble to the Wilderness Act and his words still ring true 50 years later.
“Something will have gone out of us as a people if we ever let the remaining wilderness be destroyed... It is good for us when we are young, because of the incomparable sanity it can bring briefly, as vacation and rest, into our insane lives... It is good for us when we are old, simply because it is there.”
