Jewelry Salmon Capital Of The World

July 11, 2014 ~ JodiLea ~ 1 Comment

Day 6: Thursday, July 3rd, Ketchikan

We were cheated on this port of call – we docked at 7:30am and all aboard was at 11:30am. I thought it was a typo, but they really meant four hours, then we set sail for Victoria, British Columbia. Truth be told, I was relieved. My legs and feet were talking about mutiny at this point.

The Gang did not have any excursions booked, so we wandered among the souvenir shops, in Grandma & Grandpa mode, looking for gifts for our grand-kids.

And just like anytime I go shopping, I cannot find what I want to buy, so I have to debate with myself a while, then make a compromise. I hate shopping. I may have mentioned this before.

As much as I adore my granddaughters, I just wanted to stay on board ship with my feet up. It was raining, and the lumberjack show was sold out. It must have been passengers from one of those DAM ships beat us to it. To clarify, Holland America Cruise lines always had one of three ships at the same port we were at. The ships, named “Amsterdam“, “Westerdam” “Zuiderdam” were twice the size of our Golden Princess. We called them the DAM Ships to crack ourselves up. Holland America is a DAM fine cruise line, BTW. Our trip, years ago, on the Statendam was fabulous.

The town shops are unique and attractive. There were streets (not just the main drag) packed with them, the majority being – wait for it – jewelry stores. If it wasn’t a jewelry store, you could buy salmon there. Fish and jewelry don’t mix I guess. I picked out some warm long-sleeved T-shirts for my granddaughters, as well as a couple of ‘fun’ things, and that’s all I wanted to shop. My feet, legs and back were still hurting from hiking all over Alaska’s shops in Juneau and Skagway. [It wasn’t until I got back home that I discovered the girls shirts did not even say “Alaska” on them. DAM!]

I managed to sweet talk hubby into abandoning shore to find a comfy, quiet place to read (him) and write (me). We found the library and internet cafe on deck 5. No one else was there! A first since we set sail in Seattle. We enjoyed a peaceful hour just sitting together, not doing anything. Hubby, at one point, fell asleep. I continued re-writing chapter nine and let him sleep. Why not? There were no witnesses to embarrass him.

We met the ‘gang’ in our dining room at high-noon for lunch. It amazed us how hungry we would be four or five hours after a huge breakfast. I blame all the shopping.

Our waiters, Enrique and Ashok, attended to our every need & desire (food and beverage desires that is). All I know is that we are thoroughly spoiled and 10 pounds heavier. Speaking for myself only here. I secretly hoped my sis-in-law who is a size 0 (yep, a size zero), has to buy a size 1 now. Am I bad? I love the woman very much, but come on! A size zero? LastFormalNight

Our second (and last) formal night was fabulous! It was lobster and Baked Alaska night. Hubby ordered Beef Wellington – go figure. The menfolk were reminded about their promise to dance with us on the next formal night, and lead to a lounge with good music (lots of slow songs), and we danced together for almost an hour. Sweet! LoveBirdsDancing

Although they claimed to have ‘forgotten’ all about their promise, they were good sports. They even seemed to enjoy themselves.

Mmmm… Don’t you just love a man in a Tux? 😉

TTFN,
JodiLea

FYI: All Photographs published in this blog-series were taken by the author (me), except for the couple that I stole from ‘Sis Zero’s’ Facebook. 🙂

What’s Wrong With This Picture?

July 10, 2014 ~ JodiLea

Day 5 – July 2nd, Wednesday: Glacier Bay

You would think that glaciers were made of ice it was so cold out on deck. 🙂 The skies were once again many shades of gray. Probably not fifty shades, but a bunch of them. Fog hovered around the coastline until the sun peaked out and banished it in the afternoon. BTW – Sun does not mean warm in Alaska.

Blue Colored Ice (see cave and teardrop), show a deeper-frozen ice. Apparently frozen has varying degrees.

Passengers had to stay on the ship and gawk at the immense mountains and slow moving ice. At the entrance of the National Glacier Bay Park, some park rangers boarded to sail with us into the bay, talk about the glacier, answer questions, etc.

Hubby and I hung out on deck 8, where our cabin is. It’s a smaller, away from all the chaos, deck. There were many folks hanging out there because it is a sheltered part of the ship and less windy.

We met up with Hubby’s Bro & wife – they were walking around the entire ship, to catch every view they could, I think. The view from deck 8, port-side, was fabulous, but freezing. So we moved inside to a lounge with a view.

Among the icy sea, we saw the occasional otter and sea-lion floating on the islands of ice in the bay, called floaters. It took me a while to get used to the term ‘floaters’ in regards to ice. I watch a lot of CSI and Criminal Minds, where ‘floaters’ do not refer to ice.

It was a bummer that we could not get closer to the ice. Cruise ships have to stay a good distance away. Chunks of ice, foreshadowed by loud cracking, would break off and fall into the ocean. Why did people cheer when this happened? Don’t ask me. It was so cool to watch, but I believed all the cruise ships, day in and day out, were destroying things. One would think that the park rangers would protest against this, but I suspect that their job is to prevent abuse.

The photos I took were dismal and you could not see the glaciers unless you were in the bay. Or up in a helicopter. Yeah. Right.

Mouth of the Glacier — Leading Edge of the Glacier

On the left side of the ice, where it is flat now, used to be a jagged hunk of glacier that cracked and slid into the bay. Note the blue color.

It took me a while to realize why I felt disappointment when I got the photos downloaded and into my photo gallery. Aside from gray and cobalt blue, the photos had no color. Ahh, wait just a minute!

The sun was not shinning. All the photos on advertisements for Alaska had large bright sunny mountain-scapes. No wonder it did not look familiar.

How am I supposed to compete with this?:

Advertisement for Alaskan travel — Advertisement Photo (obviously colorized)

TTFN,

Jodi Lea

photo credit: jjjj56cp via photopin cc

Skagway: The Fort Lauderdale of Alaska

July 9, 2014July 8, 2014 ~ JodiLea ~ 2 Comments

Day 4 – Skagway (the Fort Lauderdale of Alaska)

WelcomeSigns-Skagway — Hubby and I With Signs

Now I know why the locals call it that. It was an absolutely gorgeous and sunny day. Temps were up in the high 60’s. The bad news was, we had all dressed for Juneau again, so we were over-dressed. Most of us had our jackets tied around our waist.

Our excursion did not leave until 12:30pm. You know what that means – Shopping! Sigh.

So, we walked the long walk down the pier, and into town to do some looking around. Skagway is more of a shopping mall than a town. It is very cleverly decorated to appear like a western turn of the century town – down to the gal waving and flirting as men walked past the saloon.

I expected the place to be full of souvenir shops, but I could not believe the number of diamond jewelry stores. Are there diamonds being mined secretly in Alaska? Did they hear I was coming? The sales people were pushy and that turned me off. Probably not a wise idea to buy diamonds from a tourist trap anyway. They sure were purty* though 😉

Today’s adventure – a train ride up to White Summit and the Yukon. – A replica of the train that took passengers up the steep slopes of Alaska and the Yukon to mine gold. We were not allowed to get off the train, so we would not be doing any hiking or mining for gold. Darn! You can imagine my disappointment. There was no room except a foot or two away from the tracks. The train ride had magnificent views of White Summit. I made the mistake of noticing how high and how many tunnels and bridges we went over. Of course, I held my breath, passing all of those scary things. That made the trip feel even slower.

I could see why the miner’s chose this place – the rivers carrying water, and gold, from the Yukon could be panned almost since water tumbled fast, stirring up soil and rock.

Several sharp turns to travel this route. Seeing the engines way across the mountain was a bit strange. Most people startled when the train jolted and jerked around, so I was not the only chicken on board. (below)

FrontOfTrainFromCar9

Only from this railroad can you see the Bridal Veil Falls. (below) The waterfall cascades 6,000 feet from the glaciers on Mt. Clifford and Mt. Cleveland.

There are 2 tunnels the train goes through. One is maybe 100 yards at the most, the other is quite longer. Anyway, sneaking smooches in the dark was fun. I would recommend this tour for couples, both young and old!

LoveBirdsOnTrain Tip:
You may want to sit behind family members who like to post photos on Facebook.
Just saying…

*Purty, [purr tee] adj. ‘Pretty’ said with a hillbilly accent. From the Dictionary of Words That Should Exist.