With the tide out, the eagles should be out on the exposed ground feasting on spawned-out salmon and other bits of free food. Instead, twenty or thirty of the big birds are roosting in a small spruce-covered island that the trail circumnavigates.  I think about turning back to spare Aki’s nerves. But unlike the other day, she doesn’t seem bothered by the eagles. Maybe she is having a change day.

As if to confirmed that they are more scared of a poodle than she is of them, two eagles launch over our heads and fly to wetlands before circling around the back of the island.  Every ten steps or so, eagles fly over our heads. Once I counted nine of them in flight.

There are more eagles on the tidelands. Most perch on driftwood stumps from where they can watch ducks and gulls searching for food. One mature eagle sits on an offshore rock, watching the Mendenhall Glacier emerge from the morning fog.