Capturing the Moment

  Epic Alaska kayaking. Glassy calm water, temperate rainforest, and snow capped peaks coming right down to the water. Wow. I wanted to show people just how good kayaking can be in some of these secret little bays and inlets in this part of Alaska. After a morning of exploring a glacier, I took them to a place called Cedar Bay, in the northern part of Prince William Sound. It is called 'Cedar Bay' because it is the northern and western-most place you can find Alaskan Yellow Cedar trees. One of my favorite parts of kayaking here, is that the big boat anchors in the outer bay, then you kayak through a shallow narrow part and enter a massive back bay, that you would never even know was there. There are waterfalls cascading down from snow capped mountains, a salmon stream, and little nooks and crannies to explore. The light colored granite rock and calm waters make the scene almost tropical when you look down. And it can be a great place for birds like bald eagles and mergansers. M...

  We shared an intimate encounter with this brown bear from our kayaks this morning. Another Alaska memory to store away forever. We saw four brown bears this morning while we kayaked around Geographic Harbor in Katmai National Park. I felt like I really put our guests in the perfect positions for all the bear viewing. It is always a great feeling as a guide, when you make good calls on what the wildlife is going to do before it happens. It takes a certain amount of luck, and a lot of experience sure helps too. This morning was a little of both. We started off at the estuary in the back, since we could see a big brown bear there from our boat. I got my kayakers together, gave them a quick talk about kayaking around bears, and listening to my advice out there. Then we paddled in close to watch a bear move around a little deeper in the meadow. As we were watching, people from an anchored private charter boat pulled up in their dinghy, and proceeded to get off on shore and walk right ...

  A brilliant horned puffin, lit up by the mid morning light streaming through one of the sea arches. Today was one of our best days of the entire ten day expedition cruise here in Alaska. We visited one of the Shumagin Islands, called Unga Island, and explored by kayak and on land. We were greeted with early morning fog, so intense that we couldn't see the land on either side of the small bay. Luckily the fog started to lift just as we started launching our kayak group from the back of the Safari Explorer. The water was calm as glass, with no wind and no swell. Perfect for exploring all the nooks and crannies of the shoreline. And the shoreline here is about as wild as it gets. We started off by paddling over to the outer point of Delarof Bay, where we could see a giant sea rock arch that looked perfectly for kayaking through. I caught some photos of the guests as they came through behind me. I like that in some of the photos you can also see the Safari Explorer, far in the backgr...

  Our kayakers and small boats hanging out with thousands of feeding sea birds with whales surfacing in between them. We were offshore from Castle Cape, taking advantage of some unusually calm offshore waters. One of the best parts of expedition cruising, is the amount of flexibility that you have to change the schedule and take advantage of opportunities as they present themselves. Earlier in the week we spontaneously canceled the evening presentation in order to load up our small boats and go skiffing in the middle of the ocean with fin whales. The sea conditions were so calm, and the whales so plentiful, that we had to take advantage. Today we pulled into a bay that we had never been to before. Its name is Hook Bay, named after a big rocky spit with a big bend in it. Since we have never been here before, my coworker Christian and I took a small boat out in the morning before breakfast to scout out different landings and hiking areas. We found a few places that looked great from ...