July 19, 2021- Tracy Arm/Sawyer Glacier

July 19, 2021- Tracy Arm/Sawyer Glacier

We woke to a beautiful, clear, morning – PERFECT weather for the trek to the Sawyer Glaciers.  As we continued up Tracy Arm, we were taken by: beautiful views of valleys, steep cliffs with trees growing on them, numerous water falls, and of course, more bergy bits.

Since we already had two small cruise ships ahead of us, we decided to stop first at North Sawyer as we would be the only boat in this tongue and would give us a good photo opportunity.  Taking Nevermore out into the flowing current, Geary managed a few photos while Lois maneuvered Raven for the photos.

From here we travelled over to South Sawyer, following behind Stikine, a 45’ American tug, who found his way through the ice and snuggled up in a nook next to the glacier.  We chose to stay back as the ice pack, wind and current conditions did not feel conducive for us to approach closer.

It was thrilling to see these glaciers and it was also saddening to see how much had disappeared.  On our chart plotter we were 0.25 nm into the glacier, and we were still a distance from its face.





Raven in front of North Sawyer Glacier



Views of grand valleys


The 45' Stikine (in red circle) up close to South Sawyer Glacier




South Sawyer Glacier



Birds on bergy bits







Location: Tracy Arm, Alaska, USA

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