The Adventurous Falconer: Almost to Alaska

16th of July 2012

My first glacier, a view from the ferry

A little behind on posts here so some details may have been forgotten, without the aid of pictures from my camera I would surely leave out important parts! We couldn't have been happier to get off the ferry although it was an amazing ride and I recommend everyone to try it at least once. The mountain and glacier pictures below are from the last two days on the ferry which I believe were near the Wrangells. I could put in every adjective to describe the mountains and still not be able to accurately describe them, and perhaps, that just shows you the extent of my descriptive capabilities. Some adjectives to describe the last two days worth of views include: breathtaking, beautiful, amazing, harsh, calm, humbling, and etc... Hopefully the pictures will do them a little justice. I saw my first glacier and I was glad that I wasn't the only one running (ok, briskly walking) to the side of the ferry to take a picture of these awesome pieces of ice. It's hard to imagine the temperature difference, and looking close on the pictures you'll see the vegetation line run out as it becomes inhospitable for even the toughest plants and trees. I made them large size so it could fill your entire screen, giving you the ability to drink it in through cyberspace. I've never been this far north and as such, almost every bird and wildlife species I see is completely new to me, except prairie dogs, everybody from Oklahoma knows what a prairie dog looks like. After getting off the ferry at Haines, AK we decided to make the drive to The Yukon, in Canada. Driving through Canada on the way to the Yukon we constantly stopped so I could snap pictures of the mountains. Coming from Oklahoma we don't have an abundance of flowing rivers but here, within the mountains, we got to see the products of snow and glacial runoff. It is the clearest, bluest water i've seen. The dog liked it also. Now, as some of you may know that have visited Alaska, lived in Alaska, or know an Alaskan, the mosquitos are no joke. We decided to take a leisurely walk near the park we were camping at. Five minutes into the walk we were surrounded by mosquitos. They weren't particularly large mosquitos but they were like the Decepticons in Transformers reining down to eat us. Did I mention that we had insect repellant on? Needless to say our walk turned more brisk until eventually, we were in a jog, suddenly wishing we had never left camp. So, this explains why I don't have many avian pictures from the area.