A few of my favorite things....

Look for the little ship - that's us by the island. The yellow line is our course to Dutch Harbor.

 Yesterday was an amazing day for sightings - lots of whales so we were on the bridge all day and well into the night. We had a gray whale come up right next to the boat and leave a big cloud of mud in his/her wake. No photos as most animals were far away but glad we finally saw an animal we could id. A little sad when they announced, in pirate voice and ship's bell ringing, that we had crossed the arctic circle. The officers on board took off their red hats and replaced them blue ones. 

We are steaming as fast as we can (18.5 kts!) toward Dutch Harbor, a not so picturesque  town where we face the prospect of being stuck for multiple days due to multiple storms. Everywhere you go on the ship right now you can hear people talking about the end of the trip, what junk food they're going to eat, how they can't wait to see their families (most of the crew has been on the Healy since May), how they can't wait to see a tree, etc. But mostly it's dreaming about favorite things that you've missed. I am really missing home but am not dreaming of food at all. This did get us all talking about some of our favorite things on the ship. Two of mine have been seeing the Northern Lights and polar bears. So here are a few photos of those things (note: these photos are from crewmember Shu).

The water is glowing in this picture because the ship had it's ice lights on during the night.

This was a phenomenal evening - we had the moon, northern lights and sunset all at the same time!

Northern lights and aloft con - shot taken with a long exposure which is why you can see the stars so well.