Serenity Bay

Wednesday, June 14, 2023

The National Geographic Quest has speakers in the cabins, which I love. Princess ships make ship wide announcements and you have to run out to the hall to hear. At 6:50am, Travis, our head of excursions, gently wishes us a good morning, invites us to 7am yoga, and announces breakfast at 7:30. This morning he said, “Good morning. I’m a little early, but I want to invite everyone to come to the bow. We are seeing some eagles and are tracking several whales. Grab a blanket and just hurry out to the bow.”

I sort of jumpfell out of bed. It was 6am. We hurriedly dressed, grabbed our coats, and went to the bow. There were 28 eagles feeding on bubbly water full of fish. No one had seen that many eagles at once before. So cool. There were several humpback whales blowing spray into the air, and we were treated to one breach. It was definitely worth waking up early!!

There was a kayaking activity available after breakfast. We chose to go on a zodiac ride instead. There were only 6 of us, so we were able to move around the boat and get good views. Zodiac boats are rather uncomfortable from the perspective that you are facing the boat when you want to be facing the water. Twisting around gets old really fast, but you are constantly doing it to look at everything. We saw at least 50 sea otters feeding on a kelp bed, many with babies. So cute! We watched a dozen eagles fly in and land in a big tree. Dozens of seals popped up, took a look at us, and said, “Nope. Bye!” The kayak people kayaked around the bay and saw water and trees.

Next we went on a hike. We had a choice between bushwhacking, a moderate hike, or a stroll. After the biking fail, we opted for stroll. It was absolutely great. The floor of the northern Spruce (potato chip bark) and western hemlock (bacon bark) forest was spongy and cool. We wandered along to see a wooden ship that had washed up on shore 40-50 years ago. It looked like a giant planter – a wooden container filled with plants and trees. The forest was reclaiming the ship. The patterns of the rotting wood absolutely fascinated me. I thought it was gorgeous, so I took eleventynine pictures and did not come close to capturing its beauty.

There is a white bearded gentleman traveling with us, and he has a nice hat, and I call him John Hammond (in my head). (Because I think he looks like John Hammond from Jurassic Park.) He wanted to just stay on the beach today, but the people said he couldn’t because he was too tasty for bears and couldn’t stay alone. He joined us, and is hiking stick added to his John Hammond ness. Every time I saw him, my brain said, “Welcome to Jurassic Park.” and it was terrific.

At lunch, several of us ordered a side of the macaroni and cheese on the kids’ menu. Keith ordered salmon Alfredo, with the additional side of macaroni and cheese. He got macaroni and cheese with a fish on top. Okay. 🤣

We watched a documentary about salmon and how salmon is integral to just about everything. Travis said we should come to see the video and we could leave when we wanted, because videos don’t have feelings. We stayed. It was interesting.

Next,we rendezvoused with our sister ship, Venture, to get a whale expert – Andy. Andy is the head guy at Whales Are Cool Let’s Study Them in Alaska (might not be the exact right name). He said he first started working with Lindblad in 2001, before they even had the yellow rectangle (National Geographic). He said he’d be out in his little skiff, counting sea lions or following whales, and the Lindblad captains would hail him and invite him aboard to talk to the guests – offering a meal, a shower, and the opportunity to talk to people. He was the only one working for the organization and living in a little wooden boat. It was an offer he couldn’t refuse. Eventually Lindblad/National Geographic became a big sponsor. He now has a house tucked back in the forest and has 7 people working with him. He knew tons a whales. We learned about whale population recovery – whale population was reeeeeaaalllllly down and people wanted to help them recover. We stopped killing them – “it really was the least we could do” – and the populations really improved. He told us about bubble feeding, which is really interesting and cool. He was talking about how climate change and ocean acidity is REEEAAALLLLY hurting everything. He was trying to bring up some positives, but people kept asking questions about the problems, then bringing up more problems. He suggested we turn it around and called on the next person who brought up another problem and he laughed, “Another contestant on Doom and Gloom!”

Before he could try to pivot again, he looked out the back windows of the ship and announced, “There are orca out behind the ship.” Everyone yelled, “Thank you,” and dashed out to watch 6 orca mosey their way along the strait. We trailed behind them for over an hour – no breaches no matter how hard we wished. Orca are rare where we are, so it was a special treat. While we were watching, two humpbacks came along side the ship and sprayed water – presumably to see if they could distract us from the orca.

The sun was just SHINING all day. Every staff person said we are having the luckiest weather ever. There is a green blob on the radar coming our way tomorrow, so we are appreciating our luck so far.

Did i mention the otters were really adorable? They really were!