As you can see from some of my previous posts, the coast of Alaska is incredibly gorgeous and highly varied. In some regions, especially at low tide, there are large mud flats that can run for miles before you reach the water, while in other places the land drops off quickly into deep fjords that were carved out of the rock hundreds of thousands of years ago. Other areas are covered by glaciers that are miles deep with amazing forests or tundra on either side. There are even places with beaches similar to what we have in Florida except that they tend to be covered in small stones instead of fine sand. It really is a land of great variety and nearly endless beauty.

One of the prettiest places that we saw was on the way home during out boat outing. It was very close to where we spotted the pod of orcas near a point of land that we had to round to get back to our destination. The water was quite deep and a beautiful blue green color. There were steep cliffs that reached down to the water and as we floated by, it was easy to see many places where the water had washed out caves in the stone. Some of the caves looked large and very deep (some even went the whole way through the rock to the other side), while others were barely a dent in the rocks. To me, the most incredible part, though, were the small islands scattered all over the place. Some were huge, but many of them were just tall peaks jutting out of the water. The really cool thing, though, was that any of them that were tall enough to stay dry even during high tide, were covered in vegetation. It might only be some grass or lichens with one or two trees, but somehow life found a way to get there and not only grow, but thrive on bare rock! Very impressive indeed.