I was walking along the Silver Bay path, a young family was coming the other way when a little girl pointed over my shoulder and behind me. “Mama, there!”
“Good eye sweetie.”
I spun around and saw two whale spouts. By the time I got my camera up they were diving so I caught just a little with my camera, shooting through the branches of a bush.
I hadn’t planned to be on the Silver Bay path. My walk on Boxing day was along the Sitka Sea Walk and into Totem Park (Sitka National Historical Park), but as I was walking, seeing our town from across Crescent Harbor my eyes strayed east and up to see snow blowing off the mountains backed by a blue sky, so after my sea walk I got in the car and drove out to Silver Bay, a fjord that cuts into the mountains, for a closer look.
I saw the whales three times on my walk, but only once well enough to get a picture, but the view of the mountains between Whale Park and the Silver Bay turnaround was worth extending the walk by an hour.
Gore Vidal tells the story that once he was at a party and he angered Norman Mailer. Mailer decked him, Vidal got up and, according to Vidal, in one of the great put downs of New York society said “Norman, As usual words fail you.” Words fail me in describing the beauty of Boxing Day 2020. It was a fine day capped by a fine, hour and a half long, winter sunset.
