Glacier Discovery by Heli in Skagway, Alaska

My mother, sisters, friends and myself, 7 of us, were joined Norwegian Star Cruise for 7 days to Alaska. One of the optional tour that we took from the cruise, was Glacier Discovery by Helicopter at Skagway, it cost US$300, but it's worthy with the beautiful scenery that we could see and enjoy. Skagway is a town with a population of less than a thousand in south-eastern Alaska. Actually we were interested in choosing sled dog adventure, unfortunately it's not available anymore at that time, it's only available until 2nd Sep 2011.



The cruise has berthed at Skagway pier since morning, we reserved the tour at 11:30, so we had brunch in the cruise while waiting for the time to assembled. The weather was not good, it's cloudy and raining. We had prepared to wear long john and winter coat, as we would walk on ice later that must be very cold and windy.


The crew brought us to a room for safety briefing, we had to wear safety vest with orange color and also put on special shoes to walk on ice. It's very effective, we didn't need to put off our shoes, just entered our shoes on the special shoes, as if the special shoes wrapped your shoes. A helicopter contains of 6 persons, we're in the same heli with a friendly couple from Philippines.


My mother and my sister were lucky, they're sitting at the front seat beside the pilot. We had to wear a headphone for communication among each other. It's still raining hard when riding the heli, so it's very difficult to take clear pictures without water spot on the heli's windows. It's also cloudy, so the scenery could not be seen clearly. Anyway we kept trying to record the scenery from above. It's impossible to open the window, unless you would get wet and the pilot will get mad at you :-) We could see a beautiful landscape from above. A large lake among the ice mountains, also some melting glaciers which created some streams flowing down the mountain. When glacier decayed, it would bring all materials with them.


After 20 minutes riding heli, we reached the glacier where we could step and walk on it. Two crews stayed there in the tend, waiting for the visitors. They had prepared the stick and raincoat for the guests. Lucky because my winter coat would get wet under the rain, and it's impossible to bring umbrella on the glacier. The glacier was not really white, it's rather dirty with sand and soil, it's not as white as we saw from from far distance.


I had to wear my gloves to keep my hands warm, the raincoat pocket was torn, so I could not put my camera inside it. My camera was kept in my coat pocket inside the safety vest. My hands were numb, I could not press the camera button when wearing the gloves, so I must put off my right glove. Only a few minutes I could do it, my numb hands could not use anymore to take picture, and I had difficulty to take and return the camera into my coat's pocket. Lucky that my sisters still could take some pictures for recording our memory. I kept blowing air from my mouth to my hands to keep it warm.


We walked on the glacier, seeing some incredible holes. The hole seemed so small but it was very deep. We could not find them if nobody guided us to the place, because it's not obvious from far distance. The hole formed various shape, it's exquisite, the wall illuminated blue color, sometimes water flew through the hole. The guide said that glacier absorbed only the blue color. When he threw a big stone on one of the big hole, the 'boom' sound was echo when it reached the bottom.


There was also a small stream with a very lucid water, you could drink the water because it's clean and fresh. I didn't dare to try it, because my hands were still numb, the water must be very stonecold. My sister said it's very fresh, she tried it. Forty minutes seemed very short, we had to come back to the post as the heli would pick us up soon.


Walking on the glacier was fun. It was really worthy as the experience was priceless and the memories will last forever.

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