A deep mist hung over the mountains. The rainforest gave us the rain it is most famous for, and yet ahead of us the water held a spectacular sculpture garden of ice. Floating pieces of blue ice in many shapes and sizes passed our ship as we ventured deeper into Tracy Arm Fjord.
Raincoats and hats were donned and a spirit of doing the unusual filled the ship. We knew that adventure lay ahead in our excursion into the ice. Our Zodiac tours gave us close views of the numerous waterfalls cascading into the sea. Larger icebergs came into view. More and more ice filled the inlet until we could go no further. Behind the pack ice, we saw South Sawyer Glacier. The glacier popped and dropped small pieces, speaking to the numerous calving events that produced the ice floes we moved through.
Surrounded by ice in the steep-sided fjord, we felt humbled by the power of nature. We were no longer in our familiar places; we were in the wilds of Alaska.
