7-Day Sample Trip:
Petersburg to Juneau Small Ship Cruise
Sample Trips are a good guide but trips will vary depending on weather, tides, guest requests and wildlife opportunities.
~ Day 1: Thomas Bay~
Thomas Bay is great place for some sheltered kayaking and maintained wilderness trail hiking.
Welcome aboard! After meeting your crew and other passengers, we leave Petersburg for a short cruise to Thomas Bay. We have lunch enroute. At Thomas Bay we go ashore to explore the moraine of the Baird Glacier, tide permitting. As an alternative we will take an easy hike up the Cascade Creek trail. Here you can get a sense of the awesome influence that glaciers have had on the land. Kayaks go into the water here.
~ Day 2: Kake and Keku Islands~
Explore Native Culture in Kake. This small Tlingit Indian town hosts the worlds tallest totem pole.
 Today we cruise from Thomas Bay to Kake, a native village of 682 Tlingit Indians. Kake has the world's largest totem pole and a fascinating past. Look for whales along the way. Kake has a place in history having been shelled by the U.S. Navy vessel “Saginaw” in 1869. Anchor among the nearby picturesque Keku Islets, one of which is known for being the site of a discovery of a rare 200 million year old Ichthyosaurus fossil. It has been identified as a thalattosaur, and is one of only 10 known in the world and the most complete thalottosaur remnant found in North America.
~ DAY 3: Baronof and Warm Springs Bay~
The natural Baronof Hot Springs at Warm Springs Bay. Great to take a soak after all that kayaking and hiking.
We leave Kake for the Waterfall Coast of Baranof Island. This historic island's eastern coast is noted for its waterfalls, wildlife, scenic beauty and history. We head for one of the favorite stops for S.E. Alaska boaters, Warm Springs Hot Springs. Nestled adjacent to a scenic waterfall is a basin of naturally heated water for our enjoyment. Enroute, we motor into Surprise Harbor, a cove rich in history. The community, named Tyee was originally a whaling facility starting in 1907, later a herring reduction facility and finally a salmon cannery which closed in the 40's. Inside the bay is Murder Cove, immortalized in a book called “The Cheechakos" by Wayne Short.
~ DAY 4: Brothers Islands & Frederick Sound~
See a Seal Lion Rookery at the Brothers Islands and look out for Humpback whales in Frederick Sound
Photo Credit: © Rick Harner 2011 All Rights Reserved
Departing Baranof Island, we head for the Brothers Islands a small group of picturesque islands off the southern coast of Admiralty Island. Expect whales, and a variety of sea birds. Nearby is a Stellar sea lion haul out, the presence of which is very apparent given the constant roar. We spend much of the day drifting, watching humpback whales feeding and watching for breaching.
~ DAY 5: Admiralty Island~
Alaska Wildlife Viewing Opportunities: Admiralty Island has the highest density of brown bears in the world
We examine the beach at low tide to view the diversity of sea life and get a sense of intertidal adaptation and ecology. After a leisurely morning of kayaking among the islands, we depart for Admiralty Island National Monument, known as the “Fortress of the bears”. With our skiffs or kayaks we go ashore and view impressive deposits of marble and fascinating fossils which help tell the story about the shifting tectonic plates that created the coastal mountains of S.E. Alaska. Later, we motor and/or kayak in the estuaries on the look out for bears drawn to the spawning salmon. An evening crab feed and campfire provides a fitting end to the day.
~ DAY 6: Glacier Day~
On this day we head for Endicott Arm. We go ashore at Wood Spit where we examine the terminal moraine of the Dawes Glacier. In the morning, we head out through the icebergs in this amazing fjord to the Dawes glacier at the head of the arm. We nnchor for the night at the mouth of Endicott Arm and can spend the evening watching a parade of drifting glaciers moving to sea if we have an ebb tide.
Alaska Glacier Cruise : Dawes Tidewater Glacier up Endicott Arm
~ DAY 7: Arrive in Juneau~
We enjoy a relaxed morning brunch as we take in the scenery of Stephen’s Passage on the way to our final stop, Juneau, Alaska’s capital city.
Small Alaska Cruise Ship the M/V Misty Fjord underway in the island laden Inside Passage. |
