Hubbard Glacier — Local services in Alaska

This is the next installment in my series about our week long Alaskan cruise aboard the NCL Jewel in April 2024. Follow me for the rest of this trip and future reviews as we visit other interesting places.

So after boarding and setting sail the night before, we sailed south all day in the open waters just off the coast of Alaska at a nice leisurely place. The first set of pics is the views we took in along the way and it was so beautiful!

After sailing for a bit, we noticed the boat turning into a vast opening in the landline and this is Yukatat Bay. Once we entered there, now we were surrounded by majestic mountains and amazing views from both sides of the boat. Cruising slowly thru the bay, we could see that we were approaching the glacier and the color difference was striking. They explained that the vivid blue came from the pure ice being compacted so dense and that was the light wave that was being returned from the sunlight. We took lots of pics and videos that I have uploaded. In the very back, the tallest mountain is Mt. Seattle. The waters were so still and calm it was almost eerie with small chunks of ice floating everywhere, none were really big to cause harm.

The best place to view the glacier is the top deck of course so you can walk around and really soak it all in. We didn't see any 'calving' tho, the giant ice chunks that fall off, even tho we stayed there for nearly an hour. After that, the boat did a slow 180° turn around and headed out. This trip allowed for another view of the bay as we exited and allowed for more time to take in the sights and views. After we left the bay, we set sail for the Italy Straight Point destination. We would sail the rest of the day and night and we would wake up in port tomorrow. I'll continue my series there on my next...

Hypothetically a place like this is the easiest to review. Awesome, huge, massive, majestic, fantastic. And then I realize I didn't say anything. Beyond imagination - true. Best viewed from a cruise ship or a plane. I was on a cruise and the ship kinda' slowly approached the area where the glacier hit the water. From a distance I thought: nice. Great view, good light conditions (sunny day, some clouds). As we got closer I realized the glacier originates miles from the water towards the mountain peaks. We started to feel the power of nature. When smaller or sometimes larger pieces fell into the water and it was clearly detected on the ship we felt that our 1,700-people ship is just a toy. The entire experience is really difficult to describe....

I've been to Hubbard Glacier on three cruise trips over a fifteen year span. It's different every time as icebergs and weather conditions limit how close you can get physically to the glacier at the water level. Smaller boats have an easier time navigating in farther if you are planning a cruise and trying to decide between different lines. Being close to a calving glacier is one of the grander spectacles of the natural world. The only reason I don't rate it 5 stars is the variability of what you will see. I have heard people talk about a large fog bank completely obscuring the glacier on their trips, something I'm glad I've never personally...