There are some travel moments where you feel suspended for a moment against reality, when you see something that so few humans have seen, something that is part of nature all at once but could be gone or changed in the near future.  That’s how our morning at the Dawe’s Glacier felt to me, suspended in reality.

When we embarked on our cruise to Alaska, after falling in love with the state a couple years ago, we knew we’d see some amazing things.  And while there were definitely parts of cruising that I didn’t love, our morning at Dawe’s Glacier was the reason we did this cruise in the first place and quite simply – it’s the reason to do an Alaska cruise in general.  To get to remote places like this, sometimes being on a boat or a ship are the only ways to get up close to some of the world’s most remarkable nature.

We happened to be on the right side of the ship and for whatever reason, the ship turned completely parallel to the glacier twice for us (the left side only got once).  In the hour or so that we hovered in front of this magnificent glacier, we witnessed 2 different sections of the glacier breaking away and falling into the ocean, something that you can’t predict and we just happened to be lucky to see it twice while there.

There is something about witnessing nature up close, and in particular, glaciers that may not be here in a handful of years, that makes this planet so spectacular.  I’ve never realized more how small we as humans are in the scope of the world as I have on my travels to places like Alaska and Iceland, places that have stunning natural environments and places that are slowly slipping away from us as the years go by and as we contribute more and more to climate change and global warming.

For me, travel is lovely exploring cities all over the world, it’s wonderful to meet people from different places, but perhaps the most stunning and breathtaking travel exercise of all is to immerse yourself in the landscapes of Earth, to see first hand what this planet offers.  Because only then, seeing the bright turquoise of active glaciers and hearing the crackling and growling as chunks of ice fall around you, it’s then that you realize how small we are in the scope of the world, and yet at the same time, how much damage the human race has actually done.  The morning we spent at the Dawe’s Glacier was truly a great one and watching it all from our private balcony made it all the better.

It’s so important for us to see things like glaciers, to witness them with our own eyes, to see how the Earth is changing.  We must educate ourselves as travelers and understand what our impact on the world is.  Part of travel is seeing the natural beauty around us and using our experiences to further educate ourselves about what we can do for the planet. 

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