merge, a vessel, a harbour

Sorry for disappearing on you all this weekend! I went on an impromptu trip to Prince William Sound this weekend! My mom was out of town this weekend so it was just me and the boys. I have hundreds of photos so I'll spread them out over a few days so I don't drown you guys.

We left on Friday night, got to Whittier, and drove out to a little cove and dropped the hook. Then we grilled up some dinner and went to sleep for the night. Needless to say, there was no cell service or internet, which was kind of nice. To just be completely out of touch with the hustle and bustle of normal life. I feel like down south there aren't many places where you can't get cell service or internet access. I know there are places, but for some reason being out on the ocean in the Alaskan wilderness just feels so much further away from civilization than any where in the lower 48.

I snapped Dad, coming up to the bow to anchor us up...

The next morning we got up and fired off a few rounds of ammunition at rocks on the shoreline before pulling up anchor and heading out for some glacier sightseeing. On the way to our first glacier-viewing location we drove past a big iceberg. Aaaand we decided that I definitely needed to explore some uncharted territory. So, I scooched off the tip of the bow and hopped down onto the ice and had my brother take some photos of me on an iceberg!

Then we weaved our way through various chunks of ice and sat in front of three glaciers for a bit, waiting for them to calve. We didn't get to see any really big pieces fall off, but it was still fun watching. My little brother fished some ice out of the water that we later used as ice in our beverages. It's a pretty novel thing to be drinking a soda with 10,000 year old ice floating in it! Glacial water is some of the purest water you can drink since the ice was formed long before any pollutants were introduced.

Of course, Little Bit tagged along...

The gallant vessel, as viewed from an iceberg:

There was a small rock island right near the glaciers and my little brother and I hopped off the bow to climb up it. I was silly and didn't wear shoes! The boat looked tiny from way up on top the island. My brother decided to bring home an enormous rock as a souvenir, to each his own? I took pictures instead.

It's so quiet out there you can actually hear the glaciers crack and move. Every time it cracked you had to look and see if it was going to calve. The pieces that were falling off looked small but they were probably the size of cars or refrigerators. You can tell where the glacier has most recently calved because the blue ice is exposed. Glacial ice is blue because it is extremely dense from the eons of being under such high pressure. In the pictures above you can see the blue to the left of me.

Okay, well I have a lot more photos and stories to share with you guys, but this post is long enough already! More Prince William Sound stuff coming soon!