WHALE WATCHING AND WILDLIFE VIEWING IN AUK BAY

Today began with a bit of disappointment – we didn’t go up Tracey Arm as I as thinking we would….don’t know why. I know that the last time we were up on this cruise in August, it was difficult to navigate because of the large bergs that had calved off the glaciers – so we could only go part way. Maybe they take that piece off the itinerary for the cruises that are later in the season – not sure, but if I get a chance, I will ask someone.

Still a very pleasant day of scenic cruising and then we arrived in Juneau at 1:00. We disembarked and got on a bus that would take us to Auk Bay where we would get on our boat to go see wildlife and whales. Our first viewing was harbour seals. They are the cute ones – there was a small colony on one of the little islands that we drifted slowly by. Next was the giant Stellar Sea Lions. They are large and noisy. As the naturalist put it, the colony sounds like a bunch of rowdy teenagers all burping the alphabet! and it did sound like that! They were very active and I was able to get some good pictures.

Now it was time to find whales. We were very lucky to be able to spot one orca and several hump backs. The lone orca was just passing through, so we weren’t able to get a good look at him – just a few glimpses of the very high dorsal fin that was about 6 feet tall. It was a large male. He surfaced and blew only a few times and then he swam well out of view. Now the stars of the day were the humpbacks. They put on quite a show. I had a hard time getting good pictures of them as I seemed to always be focused on the wrong one! Loved seeing what we did though, and the pictures I did get will help me remember what a special sighting we did have.

Time for bed!