Cruising Alaska: Can You Smell The Aroma On Ruby Princess?

The Ruby Princess cruise ship offers a range of amenities and experiences for passengers, including nearly 900 balconies, entertainment options such as Movies Under the Stars®, and dining options like Crown Grill and Slice Pizzeria. The ship has recently undergone a multi-million-dollar renovation, enhancing the onboard experience. While cruising to Alaska, passengers can expect to encounter breathtaking glaciers, wildlife, and unique ports of call rich in history and culture, such as Glacier Bay National Park and Juneau.

Glacier Bay National Park

The park is named for its abundant tidewater and terrestrial glaciers, numbering 1,045 in total. There are seven tidewater glaciers in the park: Margerie Glacier, Grand Pacific Glacier, McBride Glacier, Lamplugh Glacier, Johns Hopkins Glacier, Gilman Glacier, and LaPerouse Glacier. Four of these glaciers actively calve icebergs into the bay. The park also features the spectacular Brady Icefield, which caps the Fairweather Range on a peninsula extending from the ocean to Glacier Bay.

The park is home to a variety of wildlife, including brown and black bears, timber wolves, coyotes, moose, black-tailed deer, red foxes, porcupines, marmots, beavers, Canadian lynx, two species of otter, mink, wolverines, and mountain goats. Bird species include bald eagles, golden eagles, woodpeckers, hummingbirds, ravens, falcons, hawks, ospreys, and owls. Marine mammals such as sea otters, harbor seals, Steller sea lions, harbor porpoises, orcas, minke whales, and humpback whales can also be found offshore.

Endicott Arm Fjord

The fjord culminates at the monumental Dawes Glacier, an active tidewater glacier that regularly calves enormous chunks of ice into the waters below. These icebergs can range from a few inches to three stories wide and float along the surface during the summer months.

Endicott Arm is also one of the largest breeding grounds for harbour seals on the planet. Visitors can often spot these creatures lounging on chunks of ice or diving into the icy waters. Along the shore, you might also catch a glimpse of brown bears, bald eagles, sea ducks, deer, moose, and wolves.

The journey through Endicott Arm Fjord offers a perfect snapshot of Alaska's wild and untouched natural beauty, making it a memorable experience for visitors.

Margerie Glacier

The Margerie Glacier is a 21-mile-long tidewater glacier in Glacier Bay, Alaska, within the boundaries of Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve. It is one of the most active and frequently visited glaciers in the bay. The glacier begins on the southern slopes of Mount Root, which is 12,860 feet (3,920 m) high, and flows southeast down the valley before turning northeast toward its terminus in Tarr Inlet. The width of the glacier is about 1 mile, and its total height is about 350 feet, with 100 feet of that underwater.

The Margerie Glacier is named after French geologist and geographer Emmanuel de Margerie, who visited the area in 1913. Glacier Bay was completely covered by ice in 1794 when Captain George Vancouver and his expedition encountered a wall of ice 20 miles wide and 4,000 feet high. When John Muir visited in 1879, the ice had retreated 48 miles into the bay. Today, the bay contains eight tidewater glaciers, including Margerie, within small inlets along its perimeter.

The glaciers in Glacier Bay are remnants of a general ice advance—the Little Ice Age—that began about 4,000 years ago. Due to higher average temperatures and lower average snowfall over the last few centuries, the bay has transformed into a 65-mile fjord with many smaller glaciers. Margerie Glacier is located at the extreme northwestern end of the bay and is perpendicular to the Grand Pacific Glacier.

The Margerie Glacier is one of the few glaciers that are advancing, growing by about 30 feet per year for the last few decades. It has joined and separated from the Grand Pacific Glacier over the years. The glacier is picturesque, carving a steep valley through towering mountain peaks and ending dramatically at the edge of the sea. It is referred to as a tidewater glacier since it reaches the ocean water. The ice of the Margerie Glacier flows relatively quickly, estimated at 2,000 feet per year or about 6 feet per day. The glacier does not expand into the fjord as it rests on an underwater ledge, so the ice falls into the ocean in a process called calving, forming icebergs. These icebergs become resting spots for various birds and animals, such as harbor seals, sea otters, and black-legged kittiwake gulls.

Dawes Glacier

The Dawes Glacier is an active tidewater glacier located in Endicott Arm, a 30-mile-long narrow fjord in the Tongass National Forest, approximately 50 miles southeast of Juneau, Alaska. It is part of the Tracy Arm-Fords Terror Wilderness area. The glacier is accessible via cruise ships, with Princess Cruises, Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Disney, and Royal Caribbean cruises offering trips to the site.

The Dawes Glacier is a spectacular sight, standing over 600 feet tall and half a mile wide. It is known for its calving displays, where huge chunks of ice break off and plunge into the sea, creating icebergs that float in the surrounding waters. The icebergs provide breeding grounds for harbour seals, and the area is also home to a variety of other wildlife, including brown bears, bald eagles, sea ducks, deer, wolves, and mountain goats.

The journey to the Dawes Glacier is an experience in itself, with passengers treated to views of majestic waterfalls, plunging valleys, and rugged mountains. The fjord is known for its azure water, stunning rocks, sub-alpine vegetation, and blue-tinged glaciers. As you glide through the pristine waters, the water changes colour from grey to jade, and the temperature dips as you approach the glacier.

The Dawes Glacier was named in 1891 by the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey for Henry Laurens Dawes, a lawyer and statesman from Massachusetts. It was originally called the "Young Glacier" in 1880 by John Muir, who named it after his companion, Reverend S. Hall Young.

Haines

The original native name for Haines was Deishú, meaning "end of the trail". The name was given by the Chilkat group of the Tlingit, who would carry their canoes from the trail they used for trading with the interior. The Chilkat trail began at the outlet of the Chilkat River and ended at Dtehshuh, saving them 20 miles (32 km) of rowing around the Chilkat Peninsula.

The Klondike Gold Rush of 1896–1899 significantly impacted the region. Haines became a vital supply centre for the Dalton Trail, providing a route to the Yukon for prospectors. The discovery of gold near Haines further increased the region's importance, leading to the establishment of a precise boundary between Canada and the United States.

Frequently asked questions