Beagle Channel

A light dusting of fresh snow this morning lent a holiday feel to the "Land of Fire", remarkable, considering today was the Southern Hemisphere's summer solstice! At breakfast we were heading almost due East in the Beagle Channel, a broad protected seaway bound by abrupt, steep, rocky shores that quickly climbed and disappeared into a ceiling of low clouds. After a second cup of coffee the brooding sky began to lift and lighten and my spirit began to soar. As we turned into the narrow Garibaldi Fjord we could see the tops of massive cliffs, some cut by sluggish glaciers, others decorated by sparkling cascades of water, reckless and beautiful; we had entered a wonderland. A familiar noise, the bump and scrape of brash ice against the bow quickened my heart and the world glittered when shafts of light punched holes through thinning clouds. Ahead of us the snout of a tidewater glacier blocked our way and we lowered the Zodiacs amongst her myriad children, while distant rumbles gave notice of new birthing. In the Zodiacs we moved like dancers on a crowded floor, slipping and bumping. Closer to shore patches of dark green sharpened, grew, and became forest. Intrigued, we landed on a cobble beach and entered the woods. Red curiosities to an Andean condor gliding atop the warming air, we soon disappeared beneath leaf and bough. Within the trees there was soft silence broken only by frequent exclamations of pleasure and the occasional yelp from stumbles on soft mossy carpets, perhaps, at times, more muddy than mossy! Later, the gentle beauty of this verdant southern beech forest will become the perfect image of contrast in our journey south, as will be seen in the days to come.