The Day Flu by as I Celebrated My Birthday!

06-18-13   

 Terry is as sick as he has been in many, many years.  He has literally slept all day and kept a high fever all day.  He is having to call in meals, but hasn’t really eaten anything all day.  Just slept and drank water.  The nurses have checked on him twice today.  The room has been disinfected twice. 

Today we went to Hubbard Glacier.  Honestly, I remember little about the day. Maybe my pictures can tell the story.  I am exhausted.  We worked so hard at being tourists last week we are all exhausted.  I slept this afternoon for quite awhile.

Before I post today's pictures, I want to tell a little about the Hubbard Glacier, which is where we went today.  The Hubbard Glacier is 76 miles long, 7 miles wide, is 600 feet tall (350 above water and 250 below water).  It is the largest tidewater glacier in North America.

The Hubbard advances in warming climates and retreats in cooler climates.  The current rate of advancement is 80 feet per year.

It takes 400 years for ice to traverse the length of the glacier, meaning the ice at the foot, which we saw, is 400 years old.  It routinely calves icebergs the size of a 10-story building.

As we progressed towards the glacier, we began to see little icebergs and grew in size and in amount the closer we got to the glacier.  The ship slowly progressed through this sea of ice as we moved closer.  We eventually made our way to about 1/2 mile from the glacier.

Our day was spectacular.  Once again we were blessed with beautiful scenery of green forests progressing into snow covered mountains.  Whales were popping up on our side of the ship.  Once we heard the blow of the whale before we actually saw him. There were no clouds in the sky and we were able to spend a long time watching and looking at this natural wonder.

Icebergs seen on the way to the glacier.  10% of berg is above water and 90% below the water!

Close up of Hubbard Glacier.  We were probably 2 miles away at this point

On left corner is part of the glacier where rock and debris has been pushed forward ahead of glacier as it travels toward the sea.

Every berg is unique

I love the different sizes of ice attached to the iceberg

Chunk of blue ice.  We heard two theories how the ice was blue.  Neither  seemed  satisfying!  Pieces of ground rock also on this berg.

All blue. Look at the markings.

Green at the bottom, snow on the top, as we approached the glacier.

What I call the dirty part of the glacier on its left side, the ground rock and debris.

Ice and snow.  As snow accumulates and hardens and grows,  this is how a glacier forms.  It takes a  L O N G  time!

Part of the 7 mile width of Hubbard

Natural Beauty

Most of Hubbard, with the "dirty" part still on the left

Leaving Hubbard as seen from several miles away.  Distance is deceptive---seems one can see forever.

Ice flow we traveled thru and a big ol' iceberg

I believe this is a NOAA Weather station