We spent the day exploring the edgy Northwest Coast – where the gentle Inside Passage meets the storm-tossed open ocean.
We began in Port Althorp, once a base for George Vancouver. Just north lies George Island, where we went ashore. While Southeast Alaska has a wild look, much of it has in unexpectedly intensive history. George Island is such a place, just off the beach we found an old boiler and the remains of buildings. Our trail took us over a former roadbed to a large gun. This weapon was situated during World War Two to guard the Southeast from a Japanese invasion that never came. On the way we passed skunk cabbage and anemones, and heard the twiddling of many a sequestered warbler.
During lunch we motored to the Inian Islands, which lie where Icy Strait and Cross Sound meet. All of the northern Inside Passage fills and empties through this joined channel with every change of tide. Currents are fierce, and nowhere more than in the Inians. While sometimes dangerous, they stir seawater into a rich broth that supports creatures of impressive size, numbers, and charisma. By mini-motorboat, we when out to visit them. This was quite a northwest coast day, and we hunkered down through occasional rain, but the wildlife was worth it. At the Inians’ tip we found sea lions hauled out by the score. Old males, huge and solicitous of their dignity, lay in solitary splendor, each upon his chosen rocky throne. They eyed us with mild suspicion, but generally didn’t deign to pay us much attention. Younger ‘lions sprawled in chaotic piles, or tumbled and soared through the water, approaching us in shy curiosity.
We also found sea otters. Otters, always preening their immaculate fur, are engagingly busy, and seem super-cute, but in many ways they live up to expectation as the world’s biggest weasels. Still, they are devoted mothers, and it was fun to see fluffy pups being ferried about as if mom were a furry barge.
Southeast Alaska is packed with layer upon layer of cultural and natural history. Perhaps nowhere is this truer than in Icy Strait, unless it be tomorrow’s destination, Alaska’s… Glacier Bay!
