We explored the ship and discovered the swimming pools, eating areas, casino, movie theatre, show theatre and piano/pool room. The pool table tops are stabilized because otherwise the balls would go everywhere with the swaying of the ship. When we hit larger swells it's peculiar to watch and brings to reality just how high and low we are going... and why our stomachs are queasy.
They say people walk onto these cruise ships and at the destination they roll off. There is food essentially 24/7 and it's a pretty good spread. You can choose to eat in the formal dining room and get waited on for breakfast and dinner, or at the other main eatery there is a less formal buffet. My parents were on a cruise ship recently and came back only a tad more shapely because everyday there were free exercise classes. Unfortunately this ship doesn't have free classes and Jahda thinks that even he is getting more cuddly!
I thought this cruise would have stunning scenery and we'd be walking through forests at every stop. The scenery is nice but as far as views of mottled green forests and wild green valleys go, our drive up past Whistler from Vancouver was the most beautiful...and walking off the beaten track isn't really an option here because of the bears!
As time goes on, however, the scenery is beginning to be spectacular in a different way. On clear days, the ship is flanked either side by mountains with snow, and the snow comes right down to the ocean.
When we stop at port there are diamond and tourist shops almost every time. I wonder what came first, the diamond stores or the ships? They transport the best jewels and trinkets from around the world to these ports. Its funny that the Austalian opals here are nicer than those I have ever seen in Australia, even in opal towns.
There are frequent jewel buying talks on ship and we now know why. We discovered that the big companies, like Diamonds International, will pay a cruise line broker a fee of $150,000 per month to be promoted to their customers. There are several major brokers. It seems outrageous but we learnt that when there are four cruise ships docked a company like Diamonds International regularly sells over $1 million of jewelry in one day, at just one of their stores at one port. After all, it's a 'once in a lifetime trip' they say... Along with all manner of other phrases to encourage relaxed tourists to buy, buy, buy.
With our eyes bedazzled by sparkling jewels we decided to get a keepsake from one of the locally owned stores. Jahda bought me a pretty piece made with the Alaskan gem stone called 'the Northern Lights'. I wore it to the formal night on the ship as it nicely matches the color of my eyes. : )
[Jahda: It wasn't quite the 5 carat diamond we saw, but it was her birthday after all...]
At Juneau (the capital) we decided to do the glacier kayaking tour. On the way we drove past bald eagles, the pretty-but-smelly skunk cabbage (a flower that deer munch on) and salmon streams that in a few weeks will be so full of king salmon that if you tried to walk across you couldn't help standing on them.
We covered up with the provided waterproof layers to withstand splashes of icy cold water and paddled past forested islands full of brown bears. The glacier was spread out before us and looked like it went down to the ocean. We initially thought we'd be able to go up and touch it but it wasnt going to happen as we were much too far away it would have taken us a long time to get there.
Swallowing our disappointment we warmed our chilled selves on hot apple cider and delicious freshly made salmon dip on shore. The kayak group leader was going to throw out the rest of the dip at the end - travesty! - but then she said I could have it. I saved it for my lunch a short while later, yum!! I also saw that the same amount of dip was around $8 from the store so that was a win.
Afterwards we took a bus to the Mendanhall glacier and walked around there. There is always something awesome about a glacier. If you see blue ice, it is usually from the inside or base and has turned that color from the amount of pressure it has received. As we walked to the glacier and back, I was looking out for spruce tree tips to chew or make into a vitamin C rich tea.
At the next port, Hoonah, in Icy Straight, we walked to a small town famous for its large collection of bears. We asked a young local girl if we could walk in the woods and she said that she wouldn't! Driving might be okay, but she wouldn't walk at this time of year. Apparently, just the other day a neighbor woke up to see bear paw prints on her front porch.
I spoke a while with a native woman selling ointments about local wild foods. She uses and sells online 'skookum' ointment made from the yellow skunk cabbage for really sore spots from arthritis and fibromyalgia. She was demonstrating it on people and a few moments later some people from our ship were coming back and saying that their pain from 10 years etc had cleared (perhaps just briefly, I dont know). She taught me about the plant 'devils claw', so I went out to forage and munch on the small fresh shoots, and then, collect stinging nettles to boil and eat on ship with my mains, as well as berry leaves to make into teas.
While walking around the town's houses we came across a large bald-headed eagle's nest in a tree. A little further on we saw an eagle flying low quite near us behind some spruce/fir trees. It's wing span was wide enough to wrap around a person! We followed it a little way up someone's long driveway while keeping a keen look out for bears.
We then made our way to Skagway. After the disappointment of the kayaking trip, we cancelled our tickets for a train ride up into the mountains (we were doing one later as part of the land tour in Alaska anyway). It was a good decision and saved some money... So we checked out some more jewelry shops ;) As we wandered around the town of Skagway, we came across a little souvenir shop with a life sized cardboard cut out of none other than Tina Fey.... I mean, Sarah Palin. And I don't think it was 'ironic' either. It made our Alaskan experience complete.
Eventually, we left the small jewellery-laden ports and cruised to the spectacular Hubbard Glacier. It was definitely a major highlight - the real jewel of the cruise. Imagine a wall of ice spanning the two ranges of mountains on either side of the boat. We woke up very early to stake a claim to some space at the front of the ship. We froze and snapped away with our cameras at the far distant glacier, not knowing that the unusually good sea ice conditions would allow the ship to get us right up to the glacier and do a 360'! We stayed out in the cold, drinking in every moment of it. We were two of the last people to come back inside.
[Jahda: there is simply no way our photos capture its full essence.]
As for the cruise ship itself, one night a 'piano man' was playing on a grand piano and singing in one of the bars. I had been in the mood to sing for a few days so when i requested the song 'fly me to the moon' he let me have the microphone. For a few days afterwards I had some people coming up saying 'oh you were the singer the other night, you are good', which is really nice. Jahda and I then started playing with the idea of working on cruise ships: he could look after comms and I could do some more work on my singing and be a performer. We spoke with one man who is a retired teacher. He researched the locations of the docks and now gives a talk a day on the upcoming destinations. The rest of the time he cruises for free. What a life!
Here'th endth part oneth.
A.
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