In 1794, as the mother ship H.M.S. Discovery, Captained by George Vancouver, lay at anchor in Pt. Althorp, a survey crew under the command of Lt. Joseph Whidbey painstakingly maneuvered their longboats through the ice-choked waters of Icy Strait.
The remarkably accurate chart the survey produced shows a mere indentation in the shoreline, "terminated by solid compact mountains of ice," where Glacier Bay is today. The great glacier that filled the Bay was by then in rapid retreat, and was the source of the floating icepack that so hindered Whidbey. Any visitor who came by at the glacial maximum, a few decades earlier, would have found the glacier’s tongue extending out into Icy Strait almost to Lemesurier Island.
Did You Know?
Humpback whales migrate approximately 2,500 miles to feed in Glacier Bay’s productive waters each summer. The fastest migration from Hawaii to Glacier Bay clocked-in at 36 days!