The 26 Glacier Cruise from Whittier: what it is and who it suits

Prince William Sound is a large, deeply indented body of water on the north edge of the Gulf of Alaska, almost completely enclosed by mountains and islands. The Chugach Mountains behind it carry two icefields, and the glaciers flowing off them run down into the sound in every direction.

That geography produces the two facts that define this cruise. First, there is a great deal of ice: the route passes twenty-six named glaciers, several of them tidewater faces, concentrated in College Fjord and Blackstone Bay rather than scattered along a hundred miles of coast. Second, the water is sheltered. At no point does the boat cross open ocean. For anyone who has had a bad time on a swell, that difference is the entire decision.

What the sound does not have, in the same abundance, is feeding humpbacks. They are seen here, along with otters, sea lions, seals and enormous numbers of seabirds, but the open water off Seward is where the whale-watching odds are best. The trade is real and it runs both ways.

Whittier is one of the stranger places in Alaska and it is worth knowing what you are arriving into. It was built by the US Army during the Second World War as a port, chosen precisely because the weather and the mountains hid it. The railway tunnel was the access, and it still is.

Most of the town’s residents live in Begich Towers, a single fourteen-storey building that also contains the post office, the shop, the clinic and the church. Children reach the school through a tunnel so they do not have to go outside in winter. It is not a gimmick; it is a rational answer to the weather.

For a visitor, Whittier is a working port with a cruise dock, a small boat harbour, a few places to eat and not much else. The reason to come is the water. On a day with low cloud sitting on the mountains — which is most days — it is also one of the more atmospheric places you will stand.