Many of these photos were taken during a cruise to Glacier Bay, others from the air, but Glacier Bay

January 6th, 2013 Tagged adventure comfort inn suites home page , Alaska , Alaskan coves , animals , environment , Glacier Bay , Glacier Bay National Park Preserve , glaciers , glaciers calving , iceberg , nature , UNESCO World Heritage Site , wilderness , wildlife Permalink
Many of these photos were taken during a cruise to Glacier Bay, others from the air, but Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve offers all kinds of adventures. What starts as a loud crack like a rifle shot is also a sign of icebergs being born at Glacier Bay as glaciers break off or calve. The National Park Service asks , what do you want to do and how much time do you have to do it in? Covering 3.3 million acres of rugged mountains, dynamic glaciers, temperate rainforest, wild coastlines, and deep sheltered fjords, Glacier Bay National Park is a highlight of Alaska s Inside Passage and part of a 25-million acre World Heritage Site one of the world's largest international protected areas. From summit to sea, Glacier Bay offers limitless opportunities for adventure and inspiration. Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve also has the 3rd highest elevation of all U.S. National Parks . Here are some of the gorgeous ancient glaciers, photos capturing the glaciers calving and the birth of icebergs , wonderful wildlife, and spectacular scenery of Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve, Alaska. [44 Photos, 5 Videos]
Waterfall beneath Lamplugh comfort inn suites home page Glacier, one of the glaciers at Alaska s Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve. While there are many reasons that this park is special, one of them is that there are no roads that lead directly to Glacier Bay. The park is mostly water, so most visitors see it from a cruise ship with thousands of other people. But boats come in all sizes and some adventurers see Glacier Bay from a kayak. Photo #1 by Larry Wilson / NPS
Glacier Bay s Margerie calving and the spectacular birth of icebergs. There are seven tidewater glaciers that break off, also called calve, into saltwater at sea level and a few others that reach the sea at high tide only. Photo #2 by NPS / T. Rains
Ice cave at Glacier Bay National Park. After a glacier calves into icebergs, melting water drips and the ice deteriorates. Some brave adventurers who pass close by via kayak may experience a phenomenon called " bergie seltzer " as the water splashes and the ice crackles, pops and sizzles as it releases ancient air first trapped between the delicate snowflakes and then frozen in under pressure. This iceberg appears blue means it is dense and calved recently. Photo #3 by J. Driscoll / NPS
Johns Hopkins Glacier : As water undermines some ice fronts, great blocks of ice up to 200 feet high break loose and crash into the water. Johns Hopkins Glacier calves such volumes of ice that it is seldom possible for larger comfort inn suites home page boats to approach its ice cliffs closer than about two miles. Did you know? asked NPS, When Captain George Vancouver surveyed Southeast Alaska in 1794, the wall of ice that filled the bay was (at its greatest extent) 100 miles long, 20 miles wide, and 4,000 feet thick. Just 250 years later, this same ice has retreated 65 miles, the fastest glacial retreat comfort inn suites home page on record. Photo #4 by Photo by Preston Filbert / NPS
8-mile-long (13 km) Lamplugh Glacier. Glaciers will always comfort inn suites home page try to reach a balance between the amount of ice they gain to the amount of ice they lose (equilibrium). Simply, when the glacier gains more ice than it loses, it will advance. Conversely, when a glacier loses more ice than it gains, it retreats. Glaciers gain ice by accumulating comfort inn suites home page snow and burying it to transform into glacial ice. This is a four-part transformation; first snow, then to an ice called neve, then to a denser ice called firn, and finally to glacial ice. This transformation is due to burial pressure applied from the snow accumulating above. Photo #5 by J. Mallis / NPS
Fairweather Mountains and Margerie Glacier. Mount Fairweather is one of the world s highest coastal mountains at 15,325 feet (4,671 meters). The Margerie Glacier is a 21-mile-long (34 km) tide water glacier. Photo #6 by Emily Mount / NPS
The Marble Islands and sea lions. comfort inn suites home page Most of these Steller Sea Lions that haul-out on South Marble Island are males that unsuccessfully competed for females during the breeding season. Photo #7 by T. Rains / NPS
Brown bear in waterfall. One of the things that makes Alaska so special is that all three species of North American bears flourish here. Bears are good long-distance swimmers that are frequently seen dog paddling their way across the bay. Most of the islands in Glacier Bay are visited routinely comfort inn suites home page by bears, and one can expect to find them almost anywhere. Photo #9 by Emily Mount / NPS
12-mile (19 km) long Johns Hopkins glacier. Glacier Bay was declared a National Monument in February 1925, a National Park and Wild Life Preserve in December 1980, a UNESCO declared World Biosphere Reserve in 1986 and a World Heritage Site in 1992. Photo #10 by NPS
For scale: Hiker and glacier. NPS wrote , Glacier ice is different from the ice in your refrigerator. The ice crystals form slowly under pressure and individual crystals can grow to be the size of a football. Air trapped between the snowflakes is also frozen into the ice at pressure. Ice near the bottom of the glacier is under tremendous pressure, which allows it to flow almost like a plastic over the bedrock beneath. Friction between the glacier and the bedrock produces meltwater which further lubricates the bedrock allowing the ice to slide. Photo #11 by Bill Eichenlaub / NPS
Reflections. The main visitor season is from late-May through early-September with the peak being the month of July. The park is open the rest of the year, but visitor services are very limited. Summer temperatures average 50° to 60° F (10° to 15° C). Rain is the norm in southeast Alaska. Photo #12 by Emily Mount / NPS
Brown Bear and ice. Brown bears tend to dwell in open terrain, but can be found in the dense forest as well, explained NPS. Brown bear is another name for grizzly bear and is used to differentiate the coastal residents from the interior-dwelling grizzly. Brown bears can be any shade from honey blonde to black. Brown bears normally weigh up to 900 pounds, occasionally up to as much as 1,400 pounds. Photo #16 by T. Lewis / NPS
Black bear in Bartlett Cove where the park's headquarters, Visitor Information Station, comfort inn suites home page Visitor Center and the Glacier comfort inn suites home page Bay Lodge are located. It s 10 miles by road from the small town of Gustavus. Photo #17 by T. Rains / NPS
Black bear feasting on dandelions. Three trails of varying lengths comfort inn suites home page are located at Bartlett Cove, wrote NPS. These trails tend to be somewhat muddy and wet, so bring rubber boots (Southeast Alaskan Sneakers). Photo #18 by Melinda Webster / NPS
Bald eagle in a tree. Bring your camera because it is a photographer s paradise. There are 160 marine and estuarine (fish) species, 242 species of birds, 41 species of mammals and 3 species of amphibians. Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve comfort inn suites home page has no reptiles. Photo #21 by NPS
First year black bear cubs. Black bears are found primarily in the forested comfort inn suites home page regions of the lower bay, including Bartlett Cove, although they can be found anywhere from the beach to the alpine. NPS said , Black bears can be black, brown, blonde, even blue/gray as is the case of the rare color phase found in Southeast Alaska called the glacier comfort inn suites home page bear. Black bears normally weigh up to 300 pounds, comfort inn suites home page occasionally up to as much as 600 pounds. Photo #22 by Melinda Webster / NPS
Glacier Bay National Park: La Perouse Glacier. The photographer wrote, comfort inn suites home page When Capt. George Vancouver explored the area in 1794, Glacier Bay didn t exist: the Grand Pacific Glacier filled it almost all the way out to its mouth at Icy Strait. But when John Muir visited in 1879, the ice had retreated 30 miles, leaving behind the steep-sided fjord known as Glacier Bay. By 1916 the ice had retreated the full 60-mile length of the bay, the massive Grand Pacific ended at the head of Tarr Inlet. This is the smaller(!) LaPerouse Glacier on the ocean side of Glacier Bay National Park. The bay itself runs inland on the far side of that mountain range. It s hard to get a true sense of the scale here, but those little textury green things are mature spruce trees, the visible peak is 7588 ft; Mt. La Perouse beyond rises to 10,728 ft (3270 meters). Photo #24 by Anita363
The sheltered waters of Glacier Bay ebb and flow with the region s huge tides, which can change as much as 25 feet during a six-hour period. When the water is calm, such in this photo, comfort inn suites home page you can see the reflections of the Margerie glacier. Photo #25 by Donna62
Glacier near Halo Bay. The photographer wrote, comfort inn suites home page A glacier is a slowly comfort inn suites home page moving mass of compacted ice. The snow that collects on the mountain is compressed and turns to ice. The weight of the ice slowly drives the ice down the mountian, in this case ending in the the ocean. For that reason it is called a tide water glacier. The bands of earth seen it the glacier are known as lateral and medial moraines. Recently, global warming has caused as significant retreat of most glaciers. Photo #26 by drurydrama (Len Radin)
The history of the Margerie Glacier is integral to the history comfort inn suites home page of Glacier Bay. In 1794, Glacier Bay was a wall of ice when Captain Vancouver was blocked in his explorations by a wall of 2 miles (3.2 km) width and 4,000 feet (1,200 m) thick. 85 years later, when in 1879 John Muir had first visited the bay, this wall was 48 miles and had retreated by 44 miles (71 km). Now, it has retreated to 65 miles as a remnant of the old wall of the glacier system and has 16 major tidewater glaciers (10 and 12 were also mentioned in some references). Margerie Glacier is at Mile 63 of this system and named after French Geologist Emmanuel de Margerie who visited the area in 1913. Photo #27 by Alaska National Park Service
That s a huge cruise liner for scale, with several thousand people on board. It was on the same itinerary as ours, so we were playing tag all the