A dominant feature of the 600,000+ acre Kenai Fjords National Park is the Harding Icefield, a 300-square-mile icefield. Exit Glacier gets it name from being an exit from that massive sheet of ice. Exit Glacier is the most accessible of the park's glaciers. We took a 2.6 mile ranger-led trail up to the face of the glacier. Their were many warning signs as you approached the glacier, since glacier ice is unstable, unpredictable and very dangerous.

We had to cross some flowing water from Exit Glacier on our hike up to and coming back down. Got our feet wet but at least no one fell! When you see how far the glacier has receeded in just the last few years it is really amazing.

The eight of us at Exit Glacier.

Another cruise ship leaving tonight....this has been a fun place to camp and watch all the activity on the water! Kinda hate to leave tomorrow.

7/28/07 - 4th Day in Seward

I slept in this morning and was still groggy most of the day from the Bonine I took yesterday for sea sickness! Guess it will be awhile before I take that again. We had lunch and then shopped in a few of the stores. Wildlife sightings today: Sea otters If you want to see where we are currently at (8/5/07) go to: http://map.datastormusers.com/user2.cfm?user=2430

Dan went out on a charter boat fishing for halibut today and he caught a 62-pounder. Dan & Jenny brought the cleaned halibut back to their motor home, packageed it and then generously shared with all of us.....thanks guys!

We had sea otters that kept swimming back and forth in front of the motor homes. They usually have something in their mouths that they are eating (cracking oysters, clams etc.) They just don't come close enough for us to get a good picture.

7/27/07 - 3rd Day in Seward

This was a very short night and long day for me. We were taking our Kenai Fjords 8-hour cruise today. Several of us took Bonine for motion sickness and as it turned out we didn't need it as we had very calm water (we have been in much rougher water with our boat)! The bad part was that we got really sleepy on the way back and thought it was probably because of the Bonine. After being gone 10 hours we had two dogs that were very glad to see us! Wildlife sightings today: Described later in the blog. If you want to see where we are currently at (8/5/07) go to: http://map.datastormusers.com/user2.cfm?user=2430

I was up late tonight (actually early 2:00 AM) when I decided it was time to go to bed. Bent down to lock the door and looked up and it looked like a whole lighted city was coming right at me. I woke Pat up and said he needed to get up to see the huge cruise ship coming in all lit up. He kinda mumbled but got up and by that time Jenny was up taking pictures too. It was hard to get good shots of what we actually saw. By the time either one of us got a decent shot the ship was by us going into the port in Seward. The 2nd picture is an early morning picture of the same ship. They said that this was the largest cruise ship to come into Seward.....2500 people! These ships sail in forwards and then back out. The 2nd cruise ship had come in sometime during the night. The large one we saw coming in at 2:00 AM is on the right.

I had to get up at 5:45, I looked out the front window to see if the 2nd cruise ship had come in during the night and here was our Eagle back right out in front of the motorhome!

This was a short night as far as sleeping between the cruise ship @ 2:00 AM and the eagle at 5:45!

Ready for our 8-hour Kenai Fjords National Park Cruise (don't know where Dan was). Kenai Fjords National Park was formed when glaciers flowed down to the sea from the Harding Ice Field and then retreated leaving behind fjords, the deeply carved glacial valleys filled with sea water. These fjords characterize the park's coastline and give it its name. Our tour was hosted by a National Park Ranger on the Kenai Star, their were approximately 170 people on our tour. There was an all you could eat Alaska salmon and prime rib dinner served buffet-style dinner while we were cruising. It was very comfortable as you had reserved table seating in a heated cabin for every guest.

We got a good view of our coaches when leaving Resurrection Bay.....we wondered who was sitting in front of Dan & Jenny's rig. Downtown Seward

Humpback whale

We enjoyed watching the sea otters.....but the little guys sure were hard to get any good photos of....they are very illusive!

This was the first pod of Orca whales that we saw....there were 5 in this pod.

Bear Glacier

Sea Lions hanging out on in the sun on the warm rock formations.

There were three Orca whales in this pod.

Aialik Glacier is nearly one mile across and our tour took us to within 1/8 mile in front of it. This is the largest tidewater glacier in Kenai Fjords National Park. Some of the views of the glacier as we sat quietly in the water to watch and hear it calving.

Hanging out at Aialik Glacier!

These cloud formations we really pretty! These clouds are hanging just over the top of these mountains. This was a pretty view in front of us leaving the Aialik Glacier that we sat in front of watching it calving.

These are puffins....they are really cute little guys and you should see them flapping when they are flying. Their little fat bodies are not very aero-dynamic. There are two different kinds of puffins: Tufted and Horned.

There were Kittiwakes everywhere!

I think these were Artic Terns. The cruise took us by the Chiswell Islands National Wildlife Refuge. There were thousands of many different kinds of birds in this rookery area.

This was the large Holland America cruise ship leaving (the same one we saw coming in early this morning).