Prince William Sound

What an amazing trip. From June 9-19, I stayed outdoors in one of the most amazing environments I've encountered. Sea Kayaking is not my usual means of transportation, but this was a fantastic adventure. I may now be hooked. Of course, we were very lucky in terms of the weather. I might have a different take on it had it rained the entire time.

We started the trip with a boat shuttle of about 1 1/2 hours from Whittier to Culross Pass, where we spent two days hardening campsites and doing a few other tasks. The first day's weather was amazing. Blue skies, no clouds. On the second day, it got overcast, but pretty much no rain. We stayed at our first campsite for two nights. Late in the afternoon on day three, our boat shuttle arrived once again and took us another hour south to our second campsite on a small island in Gaamaak cove. The site was a bit boggy, but quite lovely. From Gaamaack, we day tripped further into the bay to a Skookumchuck (a tidal pond) and a nice lunch spot where we climbed up and looked out to amazing views. Once again, the weather was fantastic.

The next day, we arose early and kayaked to campsite number three, a big beach with major tidal changes. We had to carry the kayaks a LONG way to ensure that they did not end up leaving us with the high tide. We spent one day at this campspot, listening to the oystercatchers yell at us and hoping that bears did not come visit us and the large deer carcass close to our campsite. We survived the night and the next day, headed further south to the best campspot ever.

Campsite number four was located on the neck of an ithsmus and surrounded by three bays. In one of the bays was a kittiwake rookery, in another, many iceburgs. The southern view was out to icy bay and nassau fjord and the 3000 foot peaks coming straight down to the water. The spot was unbelievable. Oh, and the weather was, too. As was the lack of mosquitoes for pretty much the entire trip. Not sure how we got so lucky, but I can't complain.

We spent three nights at this paradise, exploring icy bay and nassau fjord and gazing in wonder at the tidewater glaciers that calved for us and left our bay filled with icebergs. We saw seals, sea otters, river otters, sea lions, nesting eagles, and bears. We also visited the kittiwake rookery, which was a waterfall surrounded by birds nesting on every possible rock outcroppping. It felt like a scene from "the birds", but much less aggressive.

It was sad to leave Paradise, but we had to. We paddled across the bay and on to our next campspot, close to Whale Bay and Humpback Cove. This was another nice spot, although it smelled a bit fishy thanks to the millions of eggs fish had laid on the beach. I'm sure the resident bear enjoyed it. He left a nice present for us below the tideline, which we noted shortly after arrival. Many similar presents were scattered in the trees around the beach. I was the only one who actually saw the creator of those gifts. I was walking on another beach around the corner from where we were camping, taking pictures. When I went to take a picture of the headlands on the other side of the beach, there he was, standing on rocks looking straight at me. We were not far apart. He was huge, but not concerned about my presence in the least. As I stood there yelling "bear, bear, bear," he slowly sauntered into his cave, about 10 feet away from where I saw him. No one else saw him, so I feel somewhat like big bird and snuffalufagus. He really was there, though. When our boat captain picked us up, he said that the last people to camp there had to move because they couldn't get the bear to leave. Fortunately, we had no such problems.

We spent two nights at this spot, enjoying campfires and whale sightings. We didn't see any humpbacks, but we did see a minke whale about 30 feet out from our beach, and a transient orca further away.