If you have sailed to Alaska perhaps you were lucky enough to visit Yakutat Bay home of Hubbard Glacier. Hubbard is phenomenal to see, at seven miles in width, fifteen hundred feet in depth and seventy-six miles in length, it is the largest tidewater glacier in North America. (I say the world because all the other glaciers that touch the sea that are bigger are continental glaciers - but that’s just me!) As you know glacial ice is melting worldwide and glaciers are retreating rapidly. But not Hubbard. It is an anomaly. Based on its location and other factors affecting the accumulation of ice, etc, it is growing. Back in 1986, it pushed forward at an incredible rate moving more than one hundred and forty feet a day! It dammed off Russell Fjord and created all kinds of problems. Eventually the ice dam broke and all was “normal” until 2002 when it did it again. Well, once more Hubbard is on the march. During the last four visits the Seven Seas Mariner has not been able to get close to the glacier due to the build-up of ice. If Russell Fjord is closed-off permanently, the ice that the glacier continues to expel will be so concentrated ships will not be allowed in. This is exactly what happened to Columbia Glacier. And you may remember that it was ice from Columbia Glacier that caused the Exxon Valdez to steer up on Bligh Reef!