Wednesday, July 26, 2012: a day on the water

We started the morning by wishing Bob a happy birthday and making breakfast. Then it was on to our next expedition: a boat tour of Kenai Fjords that also included a kayaking excursion. We drove into downtown Seward (as the lady with the tour company said “We don’t really have street addresses here”) and found the boat company.

Early on into our boat ride, we had our first few wildlife sightings: sea otters, Dall porpoises, and a humpback whale. The boat took us to Fox Island, where we got fitted with our kayaking gear and met our guides for the day, one of whom used to work for Kayak Chicago. It was fun talking to her about kayaking on the Chicago River (a trip we all had done before). A few of the guides had found a humpback whale calf that had been killed by orcas (they like to eat the tongues) and showed us a piece of blubber they had kept in a plastic baggie.

The water was amazingly clear; we could see jellyfish bobbing along below us. In the kayaks, we were able to get close to shore to inspect starfish and rock formations, and paddled into alcoves filled with waterfalls and tide pools.

Kurt and a starfish, Bob and Amy’s kayak

jellyfish

We kayaked back to Fox Island after a few hours for a lunch of Wild Alaskan salmon, prime rib, and crab legs. After getting back onto the boat, we continued to explore Resurrection Bay. We came across more whales, including a mother and calf feeding near a beach and two whales ‘sleeping’ (whales rest portions of their brain at a time).  Near some rocky formation, we saw a large group of sea lions and tons of birds, including puffins, gulls, eagles, and many other species I can’t remember but got our captain all excited (the guy really loved birds).

whale tail

sea lions

puffin butt!

After an amazing day on the water, we went back to camp where Kurt prepared bacon-wrapped chicken breasts on the fire and Bob and Amy taught us how to play 42, a dominoes game.

It was a day that reminded us how precious and fleeting life can be, for quite a few reasons.

night sky

Wildlife sightings: sea otters, Dall porpoises, humpback whales, puffins, starfish, jellyfish, eagles, sea lions, lots of varieties of birds
baby animal alert!: humpback whale calf
lives saved by Heimlich Maneuver: 1