Some of the best wreck diving in southeast Alaska is on the old CPR steamships Princess Sophia and Princess Kathleen. The Kathleen is an exceptionally beautiful liner that is amazingly intact, lying on her side in 40 to 120 feet of water. The Princess Sophia is a much spookier wreck to scuba dive on – everything is either black or white or a monochromatic tone on the wreck. There is dense marine life but no colour whatsoever.
Read MoreWhile scuba diving around Inian Island is always fantastic, it makes for a fun break to go ashore at Elfin Cove during a trip and go for a walkabout – although the walkabout is strictly limited to strolling up and down and around the boardwalk that circumnavigates the small community! It’s very quaint. Very picturesque. Very quintessential Alaska.
Read MoreThere are a lot of sea lions around Inian Island and while we are used to having them interact with divers, the interaction has been different this year ie. more animals, groups of sea lions visiting divers are larger, the sea lions are coming in closer than before and there is a lot more mouthing behaviour going on than usual.
Read MoreOur poor guests – some folks were on the port side of the ship watching the bears (which got especially interesting when the grizzlies spotted something further down the beach and got up on their hind legs to get a better view) while other guests were on the starboard side watching the fantastic humpback whale action. And some poor guests were running back and forth to both sides of the boat trying to watch everything at once!!
Read MoreJust to make things more interesting, vast numbers of basket stars are all over the place, waving their tentacles around and clambering all over the poor old Gorgonian coral trying to get “first dib’s” on inbound nutrients. I kind of feel sorry for the coral!
Read MoreOur biggest problem in turning the Nautilus Explorer around in Sitka is staying focused and not getting distracted by all the bald eagles. It’s really tough as there are eagles literally everywhere – sitting on top of boat masts, perched on radars, walking around on the beach, sitting by fish cleaning stations at the end of docks and, of course, perched in trees. There were literally hundreds of bald eagles around today.
Read MoreBest of all, we discovered thousands and thousands of swimming scallops on the bottom. Our scuba divers took great amusement in watching the pink and spiny scallops lift off the seabed and swim away as soon as the bivalve detected the presence of the divers.
Read More
