Showing up on a whim without a reservation, I rather luckily managed to obtain the very last spot on the M/V E.L. Bartlett, the Alaska State ferry crossing Prince William Sound on a warm sunny June day headed from Valdez to Whittier. Though soon after leaving the harbor, the fog set in.
 
This photograph crossing Columbia Bay to visit the Columbia Glacier (a rapidly retreating tidewater glacier), was made at the point where glacial drifted, brash ice first began appearing in the water. A Columbia Glacier visit by a AMHS ferry is not always done, but ours was a wonderful diversion. For a brief spell, leaving behind the main marine highway of the Valdez Arm running past Bligh Reef, we escaped that initial, and most obvious reminder of the ongoing Exxon Valdez disaster.