Anchorage AK to Portage Lake & Prince William Sound Cruse
Before we left Anchorage, we made a supply stop at Walmart and Costco. We were really surprised that the prices in Costco were basically the same as at home. They are the only store that we have found where that is the case. After leaving Anchorage we traveled along the Cook Inlet heading for Portage Lake. The drive along the Cook Inlet was very nice with the water in the foreground and snow capped mountains in the distance. The tide was out so there were huge mud flats along the shore of the inlet. We set up camp in the Williwaw Campground, which is a really nice forest service campground in the Chugach Forest. There are 60 sites but less than a third were occupied.
Lots of mud flats
On day 26 we headed for the town of Whittier to take a glacier cruise on Prince William Sound. To get to the town you have to pass through a single lane tunnel nearly 3 miles long. The toll for the tunnel is $12 and west bound traffic can go through at the top of the hour and east bound at the bottom of the hour. If a train comes through, the schedule can get messed up. The town of Whittier was built by the army in WWII because it had a deep water port, which the army needed to defend Alaska from the expected Japanese invasion. In order to move men and supplies from the port, they built the tunnel for the railroad. The tunnel was built in about 10 months. Whittier would definitely not be the place to spend the winter, as they get something like 20 feet of snow a year!
We were very lucky that the weather cleared nicely for the cruise and the boat was nearly empty. The boat normally holds 125 passengers but fortunately only 31 people boarded, which gave us a lot of freedom to roam.
Best spot on the boat was at the very front. Also the coldest!
We watched two groups of Harbor Seals float by on icebergs
The wildlife highlight of the day was to watch a total of 4 humped back whales who surfaced every few minutes
Along the cruise, there were two Kittiwake rookeries. There were thousands of birds nesting on the cliffs. A special treat for the passengers was when a Peregrine Falcon swooped in and grabbed one of the kittiwake chicks in its talons. It was quite a sight when all the birds scattered.
The highlight of the cruise was the visit to two major glaciers. The sky was slightly cloudy which they said really highlighted the glacier ice. As the sun would come out from behind the clouds the glacier would glow with different shades of blue. Apparently the hard ice of the glacier absorbs the longer wavelengths of light, leaving only the blue color to be reflected.
A few icebergs in our path. They sure made a loud bang when they hit the hull of the boat
The sun was just right to make the ice glow blue
Near the face of the glacier there were lots of icebergs
Notice the large rocks on this iceberg. Most of the Prince William Sound is about 400 feet deep but there was a point where the captain mentioned that we were in only 28 feet deep water where a lot of the icebergs had dumped their rock payload.
Here a large section of the glacier caves into the ocean. When the ice breaks off it sounds like a rifle shot.
Some big cracks forming
The glaciers are continuously melting, which of course produces some fantastic water falls
All in all we were very happy with the cruise and would highly recommend Major Tours who were the operators. We thought the tour was a great value at $119 plus $19 for an all-you-can-eat salmon and prime rib dinner. Using the Alaska TourSaver book you can get a two for one deal. The TourSaver book is a great value if you plan to spend any time in Alaska. You can get the books online or at most Safeway stores in Alaska. The books costs $100 but you can easily save many times that with the 100+ coupons it contains.
