Whittier and the 26 Glacier Cruise

We arrived at our hotel in Alaska last night just after 8.  It was still pretty light out but after 3 – 3 ½ hour flights and a full day of travelling we were quite tired and after our much needed showers we were asleep.  Most likely because of jet-lag (Alaska is 4 hours behind Boston), we woke up at 2:30 AM, again at 3:30 AM and we woke up for good at 4:30 AM.  We stayed in bed for a little while, showered and went down for breakfast at 6:30 AM.  At around 7:30 we were on our way.  We first stopped at Walmart go get a few things we would need over the next couple of weeks.  We bought a case of water, a gallon of windshield fluid, two cans of fix-a-flat, and two cans of bear spray.  We will drink all of the water, we will probably use the windshield wiper fluid later in the week when we travel the Dalton Highway, hopefully we don’t need the fix-a-flat on the Dalton, and we hope even more that we will be returning the unused bear spray next week.

When we left Walmart it was finally starting to get light outside even though it was close to 8:30 AM.  The overcast sky didn’t help but it was kind of strange for it to be that late in the morning and you still were using your headlights.  It wasn’t quite dark; it was more like the light you’d see at dusk.  We headed south out of Anchorage down the Seward Highway toward our turnoff for Whittier, where we were going for a glacier cruise which left at 12:30.  The drive to Whittier from Anchorage can easily be done in an hour and a half total.  We intentionally wanted to leave by 8:30 so that we could stop along the way if we saw something we liked.  They also recommended that we make the 10:30 AM tunnel opening (more on this later) if we wanted to be at the dock on time. 

The drive down along the Seward Highway is almost always listed as one of the top drives in the world for its scenery.  While our day was very much overcast the scenery was truly amazing.  The road hugged the edge of Turnagain Arm, which is a branch of Cook Inlet.  We were surrounded by towering mountains which rose straight up from the edge of the water.  We could not see the tops of the mountains, as they were in the clouds, but that just added to the grandness of the place.  We stopped several times on the way down for various view points, pull-offs, and parks.  One park had an interesting interpretive display on Beluga whales, also known as white whales.  While we did not actually see any whales out in the water they had interesting whale sculptures at one of the rest areas that were made to look like the whales were jumping out of the pavement.

Despite the drive down from Anchorage to our turnoff being only about 50 miles, we could have taken all day to make the drive.  The scenery was that great even with the overcast and sometimes raining weather on the drive down.  We had to get moving to make our boat so after our several stops we continued on to the Anderson Tunnel, which links the Seward Highway with the town of Whittier, which was our destination today.  The tunnel was built during WWII as a short link to the deep water port of Whittier.  After the war ended and the military pulled out the became a commercial port.  Up until about 2000 the only way one could drive to Whittier was to drive to the turnoff on the Seward Highway then have your car loaded onto a flatcar and ride the train through the tunnel.  Eventually demand to reach the small town increased and an all road route was needed to the town.  As a result they converted the rail tunnel so that it could be used for both trains and cars.  They didn’t widen the tunnel, they just paved the inside.  Since they didn’t widen the tunnel it is only wide enough for a single car (or train), so the direction of traffic alternates.  Since trains still use it as well, the traffic movements are scheduled.  The trip through the tunnel only takes 6 minutes but the tunnel is only open at certain times of the day in each direction.  We needed to make the 10:30 AM opening according to our boat tour website.  We easily made it to the staging area by 10:15 and we were the second car in line to get through.  The staging areas is much like the staging area for a ferry, with several lines of cars that all drive on one at a time.  For our trip through, while we didn’t count how many cars were travelling through with us, we estimate that it was less than 50 for our trip based on the fact that only lane 1 had cars in it and there was a bus or two in another lane.  The trip through was certainly interesting as we essentially drove down the railroad tracks through the tunnel.

The tunnel entrance

When we emerged on the other side we were expecting a somewhat large town but Whittier is not that at all.  There was a cruise ship docked in town but the cruise ship passengers must have been on day excursions because there was really nothing to do in the town and we didn’t see many people around.  Being the end of the tourist season, maybe even past the end, just about all of the businesses in “town” were closed.  We counted only a handful of places open, most likely catering to the residents.  We found out several interesting facts about Whittier.  The town was named for an American poet, John Greenleaf Whittier.  What made that interesting is the town where we live is his birthplace.  There are many places around our own town named after him and there is even a museum at his former home.  There are two buildings that dominate the town of Whittier, both being built after WWII.  Both were built for housing soldiers and were both at one time the largest buildings in Alaska.  One of the buildings was mostly destroyed in the 1964 earthquake but the other building not only still stands but is the residence of over 90% of the residents of Whittier.  We learned that the building where everyone lives is connected to the rest of the town by underground tunnels.  It is even connected to the school that everyone K-12 shares. So despite the fact that the city receives over 15 feet of rain and over 20 feet of snow per year, there is never a snow day and the kids don’t get wet going to school.  Since we had close to 2 hours to explore this town we made sure we saw every last corner of the town.  There really wasn’t much to see and we think we did explore every last square inch of the place.  Just about the only thing we did not do was enter the residential building.  We think that the tour boat company can probably let people know that they can get through on the 11:30 tunnel opening if they want to sleep in a little bit.

The building where everyone lives

Downtown Whittier

There is a Chinese restaurant in every town

Looking down on the entire town

We had read about the 26 glacier cruise online and reviews all seemed to be good.  That plus it was the only tour boat still operating this late in the season helped us make our decision.  The boat is a high speed boat and we ended up covering over 140 miles in about 5 hours.  During the trip you see 26 different glaciers, many only from a distance, but a few we got up very close.  They passed out a pamphlet at the beginning of the trip with information on some of the wildlife we could see which included bald eagles, sea otters, sea lions, seals, several kinds of whales, mountain goats (yes from a boat!) and bears.  As soon as we left the dock we were amazed to learn that only about a quarter mile from shore the depth of the water was over 500 feet and it quickly got to well over 1000 feet.  The boat had indoor and outdoor seating areas.  While the boat was moving fast we remained indoors but the views were just as nice from inside as they were from outside.  They fed us on the cruise (Chris had an Alaska cod fish and chips meal and Jackie had a vegetarian meal) and the cruise was narrated by a ranger from the US Forest Service.  The boat passed through several places where the passageway we were sailing was fairly narrow; narrow enough to see wildlife on the shore, yet deep enough to possibly see whales (we didn’t see any whales).  We did end up seeing sea otters, seals, a few bald eagles and plenty of glaciers and other truly breathtaking scenery.  We got up close to a couple of glaciers, one of which we were lucky to see calving, which is when large house size (or bigger) pieces of ice break off the glacier and crash into the water below.  That was very impressive.  While the weather was mostly overcast we still had a great time and we think the tour was a great way to spend a day. 

Steller Sea Lions

Esther Passage

Sea Otter

Iceberg mixed with mud and silt from the hillside that it slid from.  About 90% of the iceberg is underwater so here we only see the top.

"Glacier" margarita

Surprise Glacier up close

Surprise Glacier from a distance

A piece of the glacier that just fell off

Serpentine Glacier 

Baker Glacier

Cataract Glacier

One of many waterfalls

When we returned to Whittier we got back in the car and headed for the tunnel.  We docked at 5:40 and we easily had time to walk to our car then drive to the tunnel with plenty of time left to make the 6:00 opening.  We arrived back in Anchorage after about an hour after again driving the amazing Seward Highway.  We were hungry and ended up eating at one of the better Japanese restaurants we have been to outside of Japan where we reminisced about our trip to Japan with oversized Asahi beers and yakitori.  We then returned to the hotel and went to sleep as that jet lag was catching up again.

Cars lining up for the trip back

Waiting on the 6:00 tunnel opening