Explore underwater paradise with the whole family

The Star-Telegram reports on five global snorkeling spots where exploring the beauty of underwater paradise is a family-friendly affair.

Along with three places in the Caribbean, Alaska and Florida are also mentioned.

Ketchikan, Alaska. Zip on your head-to-toe wet suit and explore the colorful and diverse marine life in the chilly waters of southeastern Alaska. Local water temperatures reach 65 degrees in midsummer. Participants must weigh at least 90 pounds. Waters are calm; some tidal pools are shallow. Later, join a half-day boat tour from Ketchikan Outdoors and cruise to a remote island for a picnic among wildlife.

Read the full story: Seaside getaways

Photo from Getty Images / Thinkstock

Endangered coastal spots to see

Coastal Living via CNN reports on nine environmentally-sensitive coastal tourist spots that could disappear in the near future. Among the sites are:

INSIDE PASSAGE, British Columbia: Much of the storied Inside Passage route between Washington and Alaska looks as it has for centuries. Unfortunately, visiting cruise ships trail a hazardous mess in their wake. On a typical week long journey, passengers produce sewage, gray water, and many tons of trash.

EVERGLADES, Florida (picture above): The Everglades is the largest subtropical wilderness in the United States, with 1.5 million acres of marshes, estuaries, and prairies, and shady stretches of pine, cypress, and mahogany. Decades ago, the Everglades' freshwater flow was altered to accommodate agriculture, growing cities, and safety concerns. The dams and diversions starved and polluted the delicate ecosystems and the species that relied on them.

ROATAN, Honduras: Divers and snorkelers rave about the majesty of Roatán's biodiverse waters and coral reef system. [Warming oceans], Coastal development, illegal fishing, and reckless divers have taken a toll [on the delicate reefs].

Read the full story: 9 coastal wonders to see now

Photo from National Parks Service

Alaska polar bear sightseeing rise

USA Today reports on Alaska's boom in polar bear tourism.

It's not hard to understand the allure of these giant white bears. Regal and majestic, but also somehow cuddly, there is a natural magnetism that draws us. Add the sense that their future is in doubt, and it translates into heightened public interest in seeing bears. Worldwide, there are 19 known polar bear populations, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Two are in Alaska— the other is in the Chukchi Sea on the western coast.

In May 2008, the polar bear was listed as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act after research indicated the sea ice vital to the bears' existence is declining. The decline is expected to continue for the foreseeable future.

Read the full story: Polar bear tourism booms on Alaska's North Slope

Photo by Steve Amstrup / U.S. Fish and Wild Life Service

Alaska mystery blob is algae

McClatchy Newspapers reports on the scientific findings of a mystery blob appearing in Alaska's Chukchi Sea.

The black substance, some thought to be oozing oil from a sunken tanker, turned out to be... algae.

Miles of the thick, dark gunk had been spotted floating between Barrow and Wainwright, prompting North Slope Borough officials and the Coast Guard to investigate last week. A sample was sent to a Department of Environmental Conservation lab in Palmer, where workers looked at it under a microscope and declared it some kind of simple plant — an algae, said Ed Meggert, of the Department of Environmental Conservation in Fairbanks.

Read the full story: Mystery solved: Alaska's mystery blob is identified as algae

Blue whales return to old migration waters

New Scientist reports that the blue whale have been reappearing in Pacific Ocean waters off Alaska and Canada.

These whales have been slowly migrating and reappearing in the area since 1997; the most since a 1965 whaling ban.

Whalers formerly caught hundreds of blue whales in the northern zones, landing 1300 between 1908 and 1965. Yet despite the ban, they seemed not to recover there, suggesting to some researchers that the cultural knowledge of the area had been lost.

Read the full story: Migrating blue whales rediscover "forgotten" waters

Alaska's glaciers retreating and melting, book says

U.S. News and World Report LiveScience reports on the U.S. Geological Survey's (USGS) new book that documents the thinning and retreating of all Alaska's glaciers.

"The new book on Alaska's glaciers used satellite images, aerial photos, maps and other studies to document the retreat of the glaciers, which began as early as the mid-19th century. Some glaciers have even disappeared since being mapped in the mid-20th century, the report found."

Read the full story: Most Alaskan glaciers retreat and thin

Where global warming is now: Alaska

The Christian Science Monitor reports on Alaska, where global warming and its consequences are being felt now.

Alaska's glaciers are melting at double the amounts just 10 years ago and melting ice is raising sea levels almost double to that of Greenland's.

Milder winters are also allowing insects such as the spruce bark beetle to survive and decimate native spruce trees.

Other problems include changing wetlands:

"Now shrubs and trees are encroaching on what has been a peat moss-dominated bog. Cores taken show no evidence of woody plants until the top, or recent decades. Their arrival implies a drying-out, [says Ed Berg, an ecologist with the US Department of Fish and Wildlife]."

Read the full story: Alaska: climate-change frontier

No worries in Alaska's ANWR

The Washington Post reports on an epic-ish trip to "one of North America's last remaining wild expanses" - aka - Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). A trip that author Paula Stone worried about ahead of time incessantly and needlessly since the trip turned out to have beautiful weather. Dangers and annoyances like huge mosquitoes and bears were dealt with humor and awe respectively. And the experience and vistas were worth it:

"No amount of reading could have prepared me for the beauty of this treeless place. I kept kneeling on the tundra to inspect gorgeous wildflowers, grasses clinging to fragile soils, swelling berries and tiny spiders, while [my husband] clambered on the rocks. Overhead, chattering birds -- most of which had migrated thousands of miles to breed here -- raced the clock to raise their young during the short summer season. The vistas were enormous, stunning: a distant mountainside was awash in pink; another bloomed wispy white. We walked along ancient animal trails, over spongy tussocks, across shivery streams, in the wake of bear, wolf and caribou tracks. A rainbow halo encircled the sun."

Read the full story: No roads, no regrets

Alaskan island of Kivalina victim of global warming

The Los Angeles Times published a story about the impact of global warming on the Alaskan island of Kivalina. Ocean ice that once protected the fragile shorelines now is open water that is causing major soil erosion. So much so that engineers predict that in 10 to 15 years the entire island will wash away.

Read the full story: An Alaskan island is losing ground