When you’ve not been to Alaska before on a cruise there’s a good chance that one of the things you’re going to want to see, if possible, are humpback whales, because Alaskan waters have them at certain times of the year. As we would find out on the second part of our tour while docked in Juneau, the middle of July turns out to be a fantastic time for seeing whales in Alaska.
A short bus ride from our hike near Mendenhall Glacier brought us to a marina at which there were many boats – well, you’d expect that from a marina – with a large number given over to sightseeing tours to look for whales. One of them would be ours.
We boarded, met our captain, and were given some information about the trip to come. There were rules that the whale sightseeing boats had to follow – keep the speed down when whales were around, and keep well away from the whales if possible – and seeing whales wasn’t guaranteed because you just can’t get them to agree to anything. But the boat captains talked to each other and if there were whales around then they would head to those locations, and there had been plenty of sightings recently so we should be okay.
The boat itself was ideal for sightseeing. When it was travelling at any speed there were seats inside for people to sit on but once it slowed down or was stationary the windows could be opened and folded back overhead offering uninterrupted viewing and complete exposure to the elements without any glass in the way. Furthermore, it was possible to get out front and out back onto small platform areas. There was never any trouble getting a good view of what was going on for anyone aboard.
Prior to this Alaskan cruise on Koningsdam we’d checked out videos of people also visiting the area and had seen some people we knew travelling a few months earlier in the season and just managing to spot a whale spout in the distance in torrential rain conditions which had been ultimately disappointing for them, so we’d set our expectations low so as not to be too upset if it happened to us. As it would turn out we’d have better weather and far more luck this bit later in the year.
If you’ve read about our arrival at Juneau then you might know that we’d been pleasantly surprised to see a bald eagle near the ship. During our hike we’d then seen a few more flying around and on the drive to the marina there had been more sitting on lamp posts. Then as we were cruising slowly out to the more open water where we’d hopefully spot some whales our captain slowed to point out more bald eagles sitting on the shore. Spotting bald eagles was not a problem, it was turning out, but that’s not what we were in the boat to see.
And it was very soon after that we got the heads up from the captain again that there were whales ahead. She didn’t need to get on the radio to ask where they were as the congregation of boats gave that away. We held our distance, as per the rules, but it was more than good enough to see humpback whales coming up, breathing out, then the whale flukes flicking out as they went back under. You possibly already know this but it’s the underside of the whale flukes – their tails – that are used to identify the individuals and each boat had a book of images of those tail patterns to match to. My wife actually managed to get a good enough photo on her phone to allow our guide to match it in the book and show everyone on our boat. The humpback whale’s name was Razorback, in case you’re interested.
Had that been our only or closest encounter then we’d still have been ecstatic to have seen the whales in these conditions but it would get better. Much better. Not long afterwards a smaller group of whales surfaced closer to our boat. Yes, the rules say stay away from the whales, but the whales don’t follow the rules in reverse.
We’d seen far more than we’d expected already and started to track from a distance another group that were heading down near one bit of coastline.
And then the birds that had been following along in the air over the whales started to circle and our guide and captain told us that this was a good sign we were about to see something we really hadn’t thought we’d see at all: bubble-net feeding.
Moments later we watched in utter amazement and incredible joy as the water’s surface suddenly became a mass of surfacing black bodies with wide open mouths gulping down fish that had been corralled into a pen of bubbles for consumption. Black bodies on the water became frothing, foaming white as the whales churned the area up then dove under the surface once again. The pictures don’t do it justice. Video wouldn’t do it justice. This was an emotional, uplifting, truly astonishing experience that you need to see in person.
After it was deemed there was little likelihood of seeing more of the bubble-net feeding frenzy our boat started to head off but then our captain had to suddenly stop the engine. A few whales had decided to cross right in front of us in this Alaskan waterway and it turns out that they have right of way. We were absolutely not disappointed in the slightest to get an even closer look at these magnificent creatures, but not as excited as our captain when one of the humpback whales had a poo and shot it into the air as it was submerging. Apparently, it’s a rare thing to see so she got on the radio to boast about it to other captains.
It was time to start heading back to shore for us now but that didn’t mean there weren’t more sights to see. A few more distant humpback whales were spotted and then we tracked a mother and calf for a little while; the different sizes in the humps breaking the water’s surface were very noticeable, as was the size of the spouts of air.
The sun was getting low and for a while cast the Alaskan landscape in a golden glow.
Finally, we circled a buoy for a little while where there were seals gathered. Had we not seen the whales then the seals would’ve been the stars of the trip, but after you’ve seen humpback whales surfacing nearby, bubble-net feeding, and flinging poo in the air then seals need to be a little more interesting than “sleeping on a buoy” to win the day. They were still great, of course.
An amazing excursion in Alaska, I’m sure you’ll agree.
In the next post in this cruise travelogue series it’s the start of a new day in a new port and an excursion in Skagway that starts with the White Pass scenic railway trip.