More Mendenhall Glacier

New Year's Day was another blue-sky day for Juneau and the temps were hovering around the single digits. It doesn't get this cold here very often and days like this remind me so much of typical winter days in the interior. We decided to head out towards the Mendenhall Glacier to see what the waterfall looked like and to take a walk out on the lake towards the head of the glacier. The waterfall was pretty much frozen over except for two or three spots where you could still see flowing water. We didn't get very close but I bet you could see the flowing water underneath the frozen top layer. It would have been cool (!) and probably risky to see.

It felt like we were on a pilgrimage to pay tribute to the mighty ice. As we headed towards the face of the glacier, there were two pathways, most likely set for x-country skiing, that had been packed down by skiers, snowshoers, and walkers. There was a constant line of people walking out and back towards the glacier. I almost felt like we should be chanting or something. I settled for a "Happy New Year!" or "Great Day!" as we passed other worshippers.



I don't know if you remember but I took a couple of pictures on a previous visit and posted them that showed ice skaters right up close to the face. At that time I didn't think that I would ever venture on foot to the same spot as they were. But we did - we got up as close as we could.


And yes, it was windy cold and my face was frozen! As we approached we started hearing all the popping you would normally hear on the ice - movement of water, the glacier advancing, sunlight hitting the long-frozen ice chucks. We didn't dawdle for too long and felt much more comfortable about 100 feet farther away.

The walk away from the glacier had the wind to our backs and the sunshine on our faces and I was actually hot when we got back across the lake.

I don't expect to ever get this close again - certainly would not do it in a kayak!

Freeze at Mendenhall Glacier

We enjoyed another brilliant, but cool day here in Juneau so we thought we'd go out towards the Mendenhall Glacier and see what things looked like out here when its all frosty out. There's not much snow but we've had a week of 20 and lower temperatures so it appears that all of the lakes are frozen - enough for skating, at least.

We probably saw 50 people skating or playing hockey. We also saw a few skiers and a lot of walkers.

Nugget Fall was pretty cool with some thawed water coming down the frozen water slide. Too bad we don't do ice climbing- this would have been a challenge!




We saw some goats way up above the waterfall - hard to pick out in the snow.



The glacier looked really blue - probably the most blue I've seen since being down here.



Those little black dots are people. They must be pretty close to the face of the glacier. (Better click on this picture to get bigger view.)

Must be a Bear Weekend

So we had the bear come by the house Thursday night, obviously trying to to find its way back to the woods as it zig-zagged its way from one end of the beach to the other. At some point he must have found his way or was "guide" by people back up the hill towards the woods.

We stopped by the Mendenhall Visitor's center on Friday to see what the glacier looked like. Its the end of the season and there was only one small cruise ship in town so there weren't too many people around. We started down one path to the lookout and there was a nice sized black bear giving a show.


The Naturalist said that sockeyes come in from the Mendenhall River through Mendenhall Lake to these small steams and creeks and provide a good buffet for the bears.






It was a little cloudy out which usually brings out the blue of the glacier. Here sit Todd, Claudia and Tim.