The Gustavus Golf Course

Gustavus has a 9 hole course that has clubs that anyone can use and a tin can to put your money in for the course fee, and Ian finally got to go. He has been really itching to hit some balls but just hasn't been able to coordinate his schedule with anyone else until now.

McBride Glacier Kayaking Trip

Oh my gosh, where do I start? We had the most amazing trip. Sorry there are a lot of pictures, but it was so hard to decide which pictures we should put on the blog, because all of them were so memorable to us. 

We decided to head up the McBride Glacier which is way up on the east arm of the Bay. This time we stayed out for 3 days, 2 nights. It was a hard trip, but it was well worth it. We did about 40 miles round trip in two days. I didn't realize how much that was until it was done. It took over 7 hours each way. We had great weather both days, which we could not believe.

We got dropped of from the boat around a 9:30am and was off about 11 o'clock. We reached McBride Glacier around 6pm. After we set up camp we made a fire. It was so much colder being surround by all the ice that had broken off the Glacier. I had brought hand warmers and put them in my socks at night, and I kept toasty, but the other girls on the trip said they did not sleep very well because they had been cold all night. 

The sight of the glacier is almost indescribable. As we traveled closer to the Glacier we began to encounter iceberg, and we had to move very carefully so that we did not hit them. For the most part the were not Titanic size, but they were big enough to inflict a lot of harm to our kayak if we were to hit them. As the tide would go out it was really neat because a lot of them would become grounded and we could walk among them. It was also neat, because we constantly heard cracking from the icebergs and caving from the glacier. They were beautiful sounds. 

We slept in the next morning because everyone was so exhausted from the trip. We left the glacier around 11am, and headed back down. We are not allowed to camp at the pick up point so we stayed on the island across from it. 

Our second night was much warmer, but I don't think that it mattered much because all of us were so tired that we would have slept through anything. We all called it an early night that night.

There are some pictures of an moose antler that Dan found just sitting in the water. He decided to take it back with him. Inside the park, people are not allowed to take rocks and other natural things, and we were not sure if this counted, so he wrapped it up in a tarp and we referred to it as 'drift wood'. It was kind of an on going joke throughout the trip.

By the second day we were really low on drinking water, but thankfully Kat had brought her water purifier and we found a stream with fresh water. That is were the we found the bear track, so I put my hand next to it to show the size. It was probably the largest track we have seen yet.

The very last picture has an interesting story behind it. The boat is on a very tight schedule. It has two points along it's way for drop offs and pick ups. But it is a very strict rule, that you must be on land at the pick up point by the time the boat arrives or the boat leaves. If you are 50 yards from shore when the boat starts to approach the pickup point, it will turn around and continue on and you are stuck out there another 24hours. I have witnessed a couple of times where that has happened, and it is heart breaking: to be so close and to have the boat just leave. On this day it happened. We were picked up at the first pick up point and it happened at the second. As we approached there were two people who were not yet on shore, so the boat started to take off again. As we were leaving the kayakers started to paddle towards the boat, and they passed very close to us. There were crew members outside and they kayakers begged them to stop because they were out of food and water. We had already left the shore, but a member of the crew told them that they would stop on their way back and the would be willing to pick them up on the other shore, across the way. So on the way back down, Ian and a couple others recruited themselves to help with the pickup, and that is why Ian is in a life jacket. But when we got to the pick up, again the kayakers were not on shore. We did not wait for them because the boat had to be back at a particular time for a different cruise later that night. We did however contact the Nation Park Service, and the kayakers were picked up a little later. It may seem a little harsh, but people know the rules before they go out and the pick up times are the same every day, so if they are not there in time, they only have themselves to blame. 

Ian said that this was his most memorable moment of our time in Alaska yet and I think that I would have to agree with him.

Cruise West Ship runs aground

This is pretty funny. So the park allows only two cruise ships in per day. On this particular day a Cruise West ship decided to get too close to the Grand Pacific Glacier (the glacier at the very end of the bay) and it got stuck because it was low tide and they stopped at a shallow area. Our tour boat, The Fairweather Express II, had to detour from it's daily tour, and come to it's rescue. It was an all day affair. Usually the F-Ex II comes back to the lodge at about 3:30pm, but on this particular day did not arrive back home until after 8pm. They had to bring aboard the 30 guest of the Cruise West ship (it is a smaller ship) plus the crew.

We then had to find a way to get them out of Glacier Bay. All the rooms at the Lodge were already full, so the front desk was working overtime to find them flights out of here or trying to find them a place to stay at one of the many Inn's in Gustavus. It made national news, and was in all the big papers, here is a link to the article in the Juneau Empire. 

http://www.juneauempire.com/stories/070808/loc_301334527.shtml

4th of July

Happy 4th of July!!! What a day we had. It was great. Gustavus has a parade in the morning, and we, along with quite a few of other people, were there. It was so fun, everyone goes all out, even us. A few of the employees put together a float to have in the parade. Actually it was quite a sad float. It was an old kyake that they covered with cardboard and spray painted white. They added some stars and called it the Fairweather Torpedo. But it was fun to partipate. When it came down the road we clapped and cheered. 

After the parade, everyone headed down to the park where the were stands setup with food and crafts. Some of our own lodgies set up a face painting booth and painted kids faces for free. For the entire day there was a schedule of activities, that anyone who wanted to, could participate in including gunny sack races, the eight legged race, horse shoes, and a bubble gum blowing contest. One of the girls got me to participate in the the last one. I didn't do so well. I started late and only had two minutes to chew two huge pieces of bubble gum and try to make a bubble. By the end my jaw hurt.

We had to leave early because, we had to work, but afterwards we headed back into Gustavus for the fire works. There wasn't a single firework show, but lots of little ones by different people. There was a bonfire again in the same spot as the summer solstice, but we spent a majority of our time down on the beach, where the fireworks would go off periodically.

The best part of the night is when Kat (a server in the dining room), Ian and I decided that it was time to jump into the ocean. We thought, we are in Alaska on the 4th of July, we have to do something memorable. I wasn't too exicted about the idea but after a little coaxing I decided to join. 

All's that I can say is that is was a 4th of July that I will never forget. We are having such a great time in Alaska.

One of the servers, Zach, is really big into Fire Poi, and he brings them with him where ever he goes. The best is by the fire, and tonight he did them on the beach. Ian took a great video, take a look.