We had great luck with humpback whales today. We saw them morning, noon and night. The most dramatic view was when the ship hovered in the flooding tide of Cross Sound at the mouth of Icy Strait. Fifty-foot whirlpools spiraled in the frigid waters right off the bow. Breaching whales attracted us onto the deck during lunch. Two whales had been parting the seas with gay abandon. Our naps were ruined. We could hear the swirling waters, we could smell the sea. The whales rose, exhaled a few mist-filled snorts, and dove head-first into their domain--the briny deep. It is hard to "get enough" of feeding whales; each successive dive is unique, each skyward flung fluke a treat. And all the while our ship held fast to the rushing sea. Later we visited George Island and hiked to an abandoned Second World War artillery installation, with its single, 16-foot gun. It sat as a rusty testimonial to a very real, but distant past. We topped off the day by kayaking in a downpour. Water below, water above--it made no difference. We were cozy in our raingear and our infamous, Lindblad-recommended, gumboots.