Sept 23, 2009 - Turnagain Arm to Portage Valley to Whittier

Yesterday, a cold, wet, cloud-socked day in Anchorage - we spent most of the day at the Alaska Public Lands Information Center, checking out exhibits, books, and watching films on the Good Friday Earthquake of '68 and the brown bears of McNeill River Wildlife Sanctuary.  The Public Lands Information Centers are a fantastic resource for Alaska travellers...I highly recommend stopping in at the one in Anchorage.

Heading south this morning along the Seward Highway again, around Turnagain Arm....

The weather today spectacular, fresh snow sprinkled along the tops of the Chugach Range behind Anchorage, the snow line has moved down the mountainside overnight.  Glaciers rising up at the east end of Turnagain Arm. spotting bald eagles hanging in the treetops.....Views across the arm to the Kenai Mountains.

Stop at Beluga Point, hike to the top of the "whales back" rock jutting out into the arm...

We make our way up the Portage Valley, past Explorer Glacier, a crystal blue tongue hanging over the ledge at the bottom of the cirque.To the Begich-Boggs Visitors Center at Portage Lake, looking across to Burns Glacier...Portage Glacier has now receded back up the valley, the terminus no longer visible from the Visitors Center.

Through the 2-mile Whittier Tunnel to the scenic harbour of Whittier; A harbor seal greets as we walk out to the seawall. 

Evening, the ferry that will take us across the Gulf of Alaska to Juneau arrives.