16 Jul 23

WE HAVE MADE IT TO GLACIER BAY!!! But before I get ahead of myself, we got the anchor up at 06:30 and headed north to Bartlett Cove. The current coming out of Glacier Bay was much stronger than I anticipated, but we still made it to the dock at 08:23, in plenty of time to make the 09:00 boater’s orientation by the park service. That was all done by 09:40 and we headed back to the boat. After topping off the forward water tank, we left the dock at 10:40. The flood tide at Sitakaday Narrows was strong; at one point, we were making 12.7 kn SOG. We were ahead of schedule, so I decided we should go further than the original plan - N. Sandy Island - and head on to Blue Mouse Cove. After a couple of hours, I realized we could make it all the way to Reid Inlet by 16:30, so we decided to carry on; we will basically see the park in the opposite direction from the original plan, but it makes no difference. The hook was set in the NW corner, where the holding is allegedly better, of the bay at 16:39. We encountered a few bergy bits on the way in, but nothing of a size suitable for collecting a sample for my evening G&T. After we anchored, we decided to row to the head of the inlet and collect a bit of ice direct from Reid Glacier. First, we rowed ashore near to the boat and started walking along the beach, but encountered a nesting area for the local seagulls, who took strenuous exception to my presence. So, we backed off and went back to the dinghy to row to the head of inlet. We finally made it against 8 kn of wind and started walking toward the toe of the glacier. After 10 minutes of walking, we were not significantly closer, and we realized that the face was much further away than we had anticipated. Since it was so late, I did not want to be away from the boat much longer so we retreated to the dinghy and rowed back to “c’est le bon”. The trip into Reid Inlet from Bartlett Cove was just spectacular; superlatives fail. We had good looks at the Carroll and Rendu Glaciers along the way. As we turned the corner to enter Reid Inlet, of course the Reid Glacier filled our view. We anchored in 22 m of water, with 135 ft of chain and 160 ft of rode out, then backed down hard to set the anchor, just to be sure we do not drag if the katabatic wind off the glacier arrives some time in the evening.

58-51.689’N, 136-49.305’W; Log = 50.1, Sum = 1515.7; Eng hrs = 8.1, Sum = 3351.4