Alaska ... a long post but the only one about the cruise

After 21 days of following our own schedule, stopping, eating, sleeping when and where we choose, things will certainly change for the next week as we join 2,500 others on board our ship. On Saturday morning I made a last minute change and arranged to leave the motorcycle parked in the hotel garage rather than the public garage near the port. This was more for convenience than safety, and we saved almost ½ over the cost of the original plan. We repacked, adding the clothes that Lynne mailed us from home, and stored leather, rain gear and other non essentials in the saddlebags for the week.
This was my first cruise…Debbie had cruised before but slept through much of her trip as a result of a Dramamine overdose, so we had little basis for comparison than our own expectations. We made these reservations in January and did some research on the ship… The Norwegian Pearl, checking out our cabin location relative to the nearest dining and entertainment. As we began the boarding process on Saturday, meandering slowly through the rope maze, hauling our gear wearing heavy leather jackets, we feared somehow that the E-Documents we had printed according to the instructions would be insufficient and we would be left to take photos as our ship sailed away. Early in the process we were told to attach the luggage tags that had been mailed to us…. it was then I noticed they indicated that we were to be on the Norwegian Star rather than the Pearl, as we had planned, and our anxiety levels increased further. So we continued slowly like so many immigrants passing through Ellis Island 100 years ago, had our passports closely studied, and were finally accepted aboard where lunch was waiting on deck while the cabins were readied. We chose this cruise line, in part because it was more casual than some others, with ‘freestyle dining’ and no formal nights, allowing us to utilize some of the clothes we have carried cross country on the bike, and we were relieved to find that the switch from the Pearl to Star did not change this… otherwise we would have quickly gone through the few nice things we had shipped out.
Sunday we were at sea all day, and spent the day finding our way about the ship, lost big at bingo and enjoyed some of the entertainment on board. As I sit in the library writing it is now Friday (Day 7) and looking back we have been lucky to have warmth (relative) and sunshine most of the cruise, which is unusual in this part of the world. Much of southeastern Alaska receives between 180 and 220 days of rain each year, and the typical sunrise was at 4:45 am and sunset around 9:45 so there was plenty of time to take in the views.
On Monday we made our first stop in Ketchikan Alaska, a town of about 8,000, a 5 minute bus ride from the port. It didn’t take too long to cover most of the shops in town including 1 of the 5 Harley shops in the state… Since we had enjoyed the Duck Tour in Seattle, we decided to do another here. The main learning point was that if a place only has 2 roads and access to the ocean, it may not become more interesting on a 90 minute tour regardless of the mode of transportation.
Tuesday was Juneau, which like Ketchikan is an island, with an interesting down town and a dealership that actually sells bikes… (The others we will see are just clothing shops) Juneau, we were told is the largest of all the state capitals, and is the only one accessible only by air and sea.

After leaving Juneau we headed south a bit into Tracey Fjord… apparently a Fjord is any glacier-carved inlet which is connected to and part of an ocean. The goal today was to view Sawyer Glacier. The passage was narrow and lined with snow capped mountains, glaciers and ice chunks along the 2 hour trip, and Captain Lars warned us that how close we get would depend largely on how much ice was blocking our passage. The Captain was always very non committal regarding what we would see in his daily speeches over the loudspeakers which he delivered using his best Tim Conway impersonation (Mr. Tudball character from the Carol Burnett Show), probably because the weather is usually so uncooperative… but we were never disappointed.
People were lined 4 and 5 deep along the upper deck during this portion of our trip and we were fortunate enough to claim a spot at the bow, right on the rail for the best views...we, like most others stood amazed at the views for 3 hours. We saw several whales along the way… I wouldn’t know one whale from another, but most people referred to these as Orcas so that is what I will call them too. Pictures of the glaciers, like much else we have experienced, do little to reflect what we actually see. As a testament to how fortunate we have been this week, the Captain would later tell us that in the 5 years he has made this trip, he has never before gotten nearly as close to Sawyer Glacier than what we did this week.

Wednesday we stopped in Skagway where we had made reservations for the White Pass / Klondike Railway trip. Again a clear day with no need for jackets (too bad we didn’t know this before we left the ship). The railway built in 1896 / 1897 during the gold rush took us up the mountain to about 3400 feet along the Klondike River and into Canada. In Canada we boarded a bus to take us back to Skagway.  At the border crossing back into Alaska, a customs agent boarded our bus just as Debbie snapped pictures of the border office.  She was curtly instructed by the agent to ‘delete those pictures’ as none are allowed at government installations. The agent apparently did not wish to deal with unnecessary paperwork as she ignored Debbie’s response and allowed us through.  On the way back to the ship the bus stopped at "Liarsville," a small town with a replica of a gold mining camp and taught us how to pan to gold.
Thursday we spent most of the day at sea, arriving in Prince Rupert British Columbia around 4 pm. We started the day in a dense fog, which lifted just before we arrived at port. The town was divided into two sections… (a) Downtown and (b) Cow Bay…. Downtown consisted of 17 Vietnamese restaurants, 1 thrift store, 1 Seven Eleven which apparently doubled as a Post Office, 1 Safeway food store and 1 ‘mall’ that included a drug store, 2 gift shops, 2 small discount stores and 1 sporting goods store.
The area of Cow Bay was located just a 5 minute walk from the ship and included 3 seafood restaurants, 1 gift shop and an art gallery… after walking the entire town it was clear why the ship spends no more time here than they do. The only real highlight of this stop were the eagles (the bird, not the band) several of which sat high in the treetops in a park just across the street from the dock. As we ate dinner outside overlooking the local marina, the temperature dropped 20 degrees within minutes, so we finished quickly and hurried back to the ship to beat the dark clouds rolling in. We would travel through the fog all night, and on a couple of occasions during the night we would hear the ship’s horn give off one or two long blasts, warning nearby vessels of our presence, and causing some concern among the passengers, including my wife.
Friday morning as I ate my breakfast while Debbie slept in, another 2 whales showed themselves not 100 yards from where I sat.
During the week there was plenty to keep anyone busy. Two main dining rooms plus 2 buffets, an outdoor grill, a steak house, Japanese, French, Italian, Mexican, restaurants and a couple of others offered all we could ask for in the way of food… some were better than others...but the service was great and you couldn't walk 50 feet without passing hand santitizing station. At the buffet there was even a crew member from Jamaca who sprayed everyone's hands as they entered, just in case someone might be less than diligent. Entertainment was split largely between a lounge at the rear of the ship and a theater all the way up front… when one show ended, we would hike all the way up front for the next. We would repeat this process several times during the day and evening, rarely finding our way to the cabin much before midnight. (I know that seems early to some but…) A couple more weeks on the ship and we might actually be able to find our way around without having to find a map or backtracking or following someone we hoped might be going where we wanted to go.
I mentioned we lost at Bingo, but we also played or watched several game shows, Not So Newly Wed Game (we watched), Trivia we won! (Says more about our fellow passengers than ourselves), entered a raffle for a free cruise (lost). We saw several shows including 2 Frankie Valley tributes (ask your parents), an amazing juggler (better than it sounds), a 70’s music and dance show called “Band On The Run”, an Improv group (ask your kids) SCTV aka Second City…. very funny, and listened to several bands on board throughout the week. At times it was warm enough to sit on deck in shorts but we rarely changed out of jeans. Most nights we sat alone but on Thursday the lounge was filled and a lady sitting alone invited us to share her table... it did not take long to figure why this woman, who was on the cruise with 300 others including her husband, was sitting alone .... after that we went back to sitting alone.
Would I do this again? I am not sure, it would certainly be a less enjoyable week without the weather we have had. Standing on deck in the rain hoping to spot any form of wildlife or cruising up Tracey Arm Fjord in search of a glacier we could not get to would make for a long week. Without clear skies we would have no idea of what the area has to offer… But like many who we talked to this week, it was on our list, and we did it, and saw and did more than we had hoped for.