Fox Creek & the Inians
Fog strips made our world look eerie. Small islands appearing and disappearing in the mist. Eventually we were off Fox Creek, a wonderful beach and an interesting hike. So, after breakfast, we made our different hiking groups, and began the morning adventure.
Our hikes took us though lovely woods, where there were quite a few surprises! The first was a set of bear prints in the ground. There are many generations of brown bears here, as this is the only species of bear on Chichagof Island (one of the A, B, C’s, namely Admiralty, Baranof and Chichagof). In the immediate vicinity we found four species of orchids ( small plants, not much higher than a foot, and on the ground), as well as the plant parasite , the groundcone, parasitic on alders. Huge leaves of the skunk cabbage marked the small mudflats and runny bogs, and a squirrel midden was seen, around a Sitka spruce.
As well as hiking, we did kayaked along the quiet waters of the small bay, and enjoyed a moment of solitude floating along!
After lunch, we repositioned nearby, in the “Hobbit Hole”, where we remained all afternoon. We took Zodiac tours to a series of male Steller sea lion haulouts. There we saw these huge animals catching shiny salmon, bringing them up to the surface where they shook them till they broke in half. After swallowing one piece, they made their way to the other piece that in the meantime, had been visited by a series of gulls that swallowed small pieces of the fish. On one occasion a young gull was floating too close to a sea lion as it fought the bigger fish, and the flying half of this marine creature struck the gull, only a yard away. It is not necessary to say that the poor bird took off like greased lightning!
In returning to the ship, we saw a number of humpback whales feeding not too far from us. So the second group went off to watch this activity from afar, and to our surprise admired a series of breaches made by these active behemoths! Some of them were complete breaches, with their whole body out of the water!
Birdwatchers were also satisfied and happy, as a good number of sea birds were encountered, among the one everyone wanted to see: the puffin. They flew in small groups around us, back and forth! What an active day!
