Saginaw Bay/Frederick Sound
"Emotionally I want it to be a wolf, but I think it¡'s a coyote." Morning in Saginaw Bay started with animals streaming out of the woods, drawn to the salmon filled creek. Our shipboard vantage allowed us to scan 360 degrees and see the three bears fishing ahead of us, the three debated canines that joined them as well, the fourth bear coming up from the left shoreline and harbor seals that bobbed up and down in a peek-a-boo fashion off our starboard side. Amongst the beach cobbles were a half dozen or so eagles as well. A low tide of minus 2.2 feet gave salmon headed upstream a shallow and treacherous swath to cross, perfect conditions for the opportunists feeding on shore.
Taking advantage of this tide we started our morning excursion rotating amongst the activities of kayaking, tide pooling and checking out the fossils exposed along a rocky bluff. This was the inaugural voyage for most of our gleaming new rubber boots. A particularly festive pair is shown in the foreground of our photo today. The slurping quality of the intertidal mud made us glad for this functional piece of footwear.
For the afternoon we headed north towards the Brothers Islands in Frederick Sound. Our hopes for finding humpback whales were fulfilled as the calm waters erupted with not only mists of whale breath but a few whale bodies as well. A cow and calf pair of humpbacks did their utmost to accomplish synchronized breaching. While half of us watched this splashing spectacle from the bow of the Sea Bird, the calm conditions and plentiful cetaceans allowed us to deploy our fleet of Zodiacs for a water level viewing as well. With our oceanic perspective, the whales grew a whole lot bigger, the explosive sound of their exhalations seemed much louder, and look how high the splash of a breach goes! These few words typed on a page fail miserably in portraying the inner grins we all carry with us now. And that was just the first day...
"Emotionally I want it to be a wolf, but I think it¡'s a coyote." Morning in Saginaw Bay started with animals streaming out of the woods, drawn to the salmon filled creek. Our shipboard vantage allowed us to scan 360 degrees and see the three bears fishing ahead of us, the three debated canines that joined them as well, the fourth bear coming up from the left shoreline and harbor seals that bobbed up and down in a peek-a-boo fashion off our starboard side. Amongst the beach cobbles were a half dozen or so eagles as well. A low tide of minus 2.2 feet gave salmon headed upstream a shallow and treacherous swath to cross, perfect conditions for the opportunists feeding on shore.
Taking advantage of this tide we started our morning excursion rotating amongst the activities of kayaking, tide pooling and checking out the fossils exposed along a rocky bluff. This was the inaugural voyage for most of our gleaming new rubber boots. A particularly festive pair is shown in the foreground of our photo today. The slurping quality of the intertidal mud made us glad for this functional piece of footwear.
For the afternoon we headed north towards the Brothers Islands in Frederick Sound. Our hopes for finding humpback whales were fulfilled as the calm waters erupted with not only mists of whale breath but a few whale bodies as well. A cow and calf pair of humpbacks did their utmost to accomplish synchronized breaching. While half of us watched this splashing spectacle from the bow of the Sea Bird, the calm conditions and plentiful cetaceans allowed us to deploy our fleet of Zodiacs for a water level viewing as well. With our oceanic perspective, the whales grew a whole lot bigger, the explosive sound of their exhalations seemed much louder, and look how high the splash of a breach goes! These few words typed on a page fail miserably in portraying the inner grins we all carry with us now. And that was just the first day...
