Icy Strait Point
Whales!!
The Icy Strait cruise port is the only locally owned cruise port in the US. It is located in Alaska’s largest Native Tlingit village of Hoonah. During the summer large pods of whales feed and spawn here so we took a whale watch tour and it did not disappoint. We saw a pod of Orcas which we were told is not a common occurrence and more humpback whales than we could count. It was quite amazing. We also saw a number of bald eagles.flying around.
After our whale watch we walked around the cruise dock area, had some more Dungeness crab that was caught a few hundred feet away and even got to toast marshmallows with a native Athabaskan and got to hear stories of how she raises reindeer up near the Bering Strait during the winter.
Charlie loved just throwing rocks in to the ocean.
As we we walked along the beach to the ship we saw another whale near the shore. We were told he swam under a number of the kyakers earlier in the the day. We also saw an eagle just relaxing on a post near the ship.
We were the last cruise ship to leave port and boarding time was not until 7PM so we took advantage of the time to ride the free gondolas from the one cruise dock to the other. The last time we were in Icy Strait we had to tender into the port. Now there are 2 piers. The gondola connects the 2 piers and the second pier is a bit far to walk so the gondola was a great add. We also did part of the nature walk whcihconnects the 2 piers. It was a nice walk and the scenery was lovely.
