Chatham Strait & Baranof Island
Each day of this voyage comes with surprises. Steel grey clouds hid the sun today as we sailed down Chatham Strait, but nature served up her best to make it special anyway. One of the first highlights was Kasnyku Falls tumbling hundreds of feet into the ocean...part of the never ending cycle of snow to melt-water running to the sea to then evaporate into clouds that pile into the mountains to precipitate… endless recycling that is the engine of life-giving water.
As we steamed away from the cascade, humpback whales rose from the glassy sea thrashing their tails presumably to round up a ball of fish before lunging forward with their wide mouths open to engulf a piscine meal. Eventually, the great whales were temporarily satisfied and began to log or rest on the surface to digest.
After our lunch, a pod of Dall’s porpoise came to ride our bow wave. These black and white torpedoes came out of nowhere to tease us for a few moments with their aquatic antics then suddenly disappeared. Only our pictures prove that they really exist.
Late afternoon found us cruising into Gut Bay, an incongruous name for one of most beautiful fjords of Baranof Island. Some guests took to the kayaks to explore while others boarded Zodiacs for a look at this peaceful sanctuary. Harbor seals silently surfaced and stared at us with unblinking eyes then slid quietly below the surface. A river otter dove into the sea, swam a short distance and then scrambled back on shore and vanished into the forest. All of this watched by us and numerous bald eagles perched in tall Sitka spruces and western hemlocks standing like sentinels on the lower granitic slopes. Definitely Southeast Alaska at its best.
