In the late afternoon of the last cruise day we turn into Prince William Sound, seemingly the playground for Anchorage - its alive with pleasure craft in warm sunshine. We sit on our balcony in shirt sleeves. We see otters cruising passed on their backs: enjoying the spectacle of us no doubt!
And then we head up College Fjord. Almost immediately, as if by magic, it turns cold - there are chunks of ice floating in the water even.
And there they are: glacier after glacier feeding into the fjord. At the end of the fjord is the daddy of them all (I’ll find out its name and add it in later). This glacier is 2 miles wide and 300 feet high when it reaches the water. Ice calves off frequently and floats away on the water crackling and popping, I guess as oxygen interacts with the glacial ice. This is interspersed with what sounds like cracks of thunder, but is in fact the ice cracking as it moves down the mountainside.
The experience is overwhelmingly powerful and awe inspiring. Our huge ship has the fjord to itself and spends a whole hour slowly spinning round so that everyone gets a good look. This is something that can only be experienced by boat. Makes the whole cruise worthwhile.
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