Location:

This bay is located approximately 1100 miles North of Vancouver and is a strictly controlled nature reserve. The Bay is some 60 miles in length and ends at the outfall of the Marjorie and Grand Pacific Glaciers. These glaciers are renowned for calving icebergs as the ice falls away from the glacier and into the sea.

When this bay was first discovered by John Muir in in 1879, it did not exist as such, because the bay was filled with glaciers. Nowadays the glaciers have retreated and access is conditional upon the absence of whales at the mouth of the bay, as well as all ships visiting the bay being accompanied by park ranger(s). This is the kind of place you pinch yourself later and say “did I really do that?”

Context:

In the words of the US National Parks Service, Glacier Bay is “a globally significant marine and terrestrial wilderness sanctuary” located in SE Alaska, to the west of Juneau. Surprisingly, Juneau is the capital of Alaska but is only reachable by aircraft or by sea, which gives some idea of the remoteness of the area.

Traces of human presence in Glacier Bay have been dated as early as 10,000 years ago but are few and far between. It is thought that the main reason for this is the extensive glaciation and any existing relics or artefacts may have been sept away by glacier action. Before the United States purchased the Alaskan territory, in 1867, from Russia, it is reckoned that Russian fur traders were in the area in the mid 18^th century and native Tlingit tribes were the only inhabitants.  A visit by Jean-Francois de Galaup, who explored the Alaskan Coast on foot in 1786, is recorded and he became the first European known to have visited. The main interest in the area was that of the Russians, until US prospectors and others were drawn to the area by the Klondike gold rush of the 1890s.

John Muir, the pioneering American Naturalist–Mountaineer, came to Glacier Bay in 1879 in order to research the formation of glaciated landscapes for his work to establish the first US National Park based on Yosemite (inaugurated in 1880). Further visits by Muir, to Glacier Bay, followed in 1880, 1890 and 1899 forming the basis of his book “Travels in Alaska”(1915), that promoted the Inner Passage as well as Glacier Bay. In recognition of his work, the Muir Glacier, which at one time towered 300ft above the Glacier Bay tide line, was named after John Muir.

In 1925 Glacier Bay was designated a US National Monument, in 1978 the monument was extended and in 1980 the Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve was formed, with an overall area of 5,037 sq miles. The Canada-US border approaches to within 15miles of the ocean at Mount Fairweather and the limit of Glacier bay is bordered by the Grand Pacific Glacier at the end of Tarr Inlet.

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As with glaciers elsewhere, those in Glacier Bay are melting and retreating back compared to the lengths previously noted. When John Muir visited in 1879, Glacier Bay was virtually full to within 35 miles of the mouth of the bay, which is nowadays clear of ice to a distance of some 75 miles from the Glacier Bay mouth. (Between 1780 and 1907 the glaciation of the main inlet has retreated 75 miles). Today, Glacier Bay has 7 tidewater glaciers and 4 high tidewater glaciers, of these 11 glaciers 4 of them calve icebergs into the sea. The Muir Glacier receded to such an extent that it was no longer a tide glacier in 1994. The retreat in Glacier Bay is rated as one of the fastest ever observed but in two cases there are Glaciers that are holding position (Margerie Glacier) or advancing (John Hopkins Glacier at 3 metres per day).

In addition to the glaciers, the district has many high mountains that are the forming grounds for the glaciers. For example, Mount Quincy Adams at the head of Margerie Glacier rises to 13,650 ft and the highest mountain in the park is Mount Fairweather (15,300 ft). In the high corries the accumulated snow is weighted down by further snow falls and is eventually compacted into ice that is the precursor to the formation of a glacier.  

Each year there are some 470,000 visitors to Glacier Bay National Park and 80% of these visitors make the journey on Cruise Liners travelling from Seattle and Vancouver (from South) or Anchorage (from North). Each cruise ship has approx. 2,500 passengers, which equates to 150 cruise ships visiting each year and explains why the Park Rangers are keen to keep proper control. In 2016 it was my privilege, along with my wife, to visit Glacier Bay as part of a cruise up the Inner Passage on the Holland-America MV Amsterdam. Any photographs of this spectacular place cannot do justice to the scale and majesty; as well as to provide a graphic example of what is happening to global glaciation.    

Rick Spurgeon, 10-Jan-2021    

Glacier Bay Contact Sheet for Reference: