This morning I woke up in the Blashke Islands. The water was again very still and mirror-like.
Breakfast today was chilaquiles, which was pretty good, scrambled eggs, sausage and breakfast potatoes.
After breakfast I was to wait until low tide to go snorkeling. They did test fit us into the ultra thick wet suits after breakfast. Of course I needed to go to the bathroom after I managed to get the wet suit on. It felt like I had an extra activity today – snorkeling plus putting on the wet suit.
I took a few more pictures from the ship before it was time to go snorkeling.
We were taken by the skiff to the snorkeling location near the ship. The water was initially cold and disorienting. The buoyancy of the wet suit was also a bit disorienting at first. In addition to the the wet suit seen above there was a hood that covered my head and face as well as boots that covered my feet and gloves.
Under the water was a kelp forest and I got to see sea cucumbers, jellyfish and some small crabs. It never really got too cold, although my hands were the coldest.
After snorkeling I jumped into the hot tub to warm up and relax a little.
I took a quick shower before lunch to get the wet suit neoprene and hot tub chemical smell off. (hint: it’s not a good combination)
Lunch today was cheeseburgers and macaroni salad. The burgers were actually quite good.
buns, cheeseburgers and Joe Joe Fries
The skiff tour today was quite productive. Not only did we see sea otters, harbor seals and bald eagles, but we also saw a mink! The mink was pretty small (smaller than a house cat, probably smaller than a NYC rat too…) and I was surprised that we were able to find such a small animal.
sea otter… not to be confused with the otter box you put your phone into harbor seals….one is a baby bald eagle, but you already knew that it’s a coat… Mink must have gotten into a bar fight, the mink only has one eye same one eyed mink I think the mink was curious because it stared at us for a while the mink finally decided to move on Nurse tree log. Hard to see with the forest behind it, but literally trees are growing up from the log of a fallen tree
After the skiff tour the ship pulled up anchor and sailed away. I took a few more pictures of all the little islands and just before dinner we spotted yet another whale. I managed to get a decent photo of it’s tail as well, but it also didn’t breach.
Dinner tonight was a choice of duck or scallops…. and I really do like duck. The vegetarian option was gnocchi – so I ordered the duck and a small bit of the gnocchi. The gnocchi was amazing, even was slightly crunchy which added some complexity to it. I did also enjoy the duck.
Butternut squash soup Duck (gnocchi is in the cup) delicious apple strudel
One of the guides gave us a presentation on the history of Russia in Alaska, the original Russian expeditions and the fur trade.
After the presentation I enjoyed the sunset outside and took some more pictures. It’s really difficult to explain how beautiful Alaska is because even the pictures don’t quite do it justice.
I popped into the bridge (they have an open bridge policy from 8 AM to 8 PM) and found out that the ship would pass through the Wrangell Narrows at midnight for a couple of hours.
I woke up at midnight to set up the GoPro for a time lapse video. It actually came out very nice, later the second mate who was driving asked for a copy of the video. Below is a picture of how it looked when I first started the time lapse video… very beautiful with the orange/blue sky.
