BrusselsGirl07

Thank you Calebrity-fan! I originally was looking at the Rockies and spending more time in Vancouver, but I am very happy we did the itinerary that we did. The Rockies will be the part we explore next time we visit Alaska, probably post-cruise. I hope you have a wonderful adventure when you go. Yvette

We were back on board by 4pm, and got ready for formal night and our dinner with the Captain. We went to the Captain’s Club cocktail hour and met up with our new friends from the previous night. One of the couples had mentioned that they had dined at the Captain’s Table with an officer on their previous cruise (they were doing a B2B) and we told them we were dining with the Captain that night! They were really pleased for us.

We met Lionel, the Captain’s Club Host, in the Cellar Master’s Bar and had champagne and hors d’oeuvres while we waited for the other guests. Another couple was already there, and another couple came just after us. The Captain arrived and the last couple had not turned up as yet. The Captain said to Lionel that it was rude to keep the rest of us waiting, and to head to the table. As we all got up to follow Lionel and the Captain, the other couple rushed up and apologised.

The table looked lovely with red roses in the middle. There were name cards at each place setting. I was seated on the Captain’s right and Bill was next to me. We all had to look up at the balcony and have our photo taken before disturbing our beautifully folded napkins. Our menus had been specially printed. The Captain was really nice and very easy to talk to. I asked about his home and family, his career and how he came to work for Celebrity. He in turn asked lots of questions about Australia, our government and economy.

The Captain said he only dined with guests once on each of the 7 day Alaskan cruises, on the last formal night, so we felt very lucky to have been asked. At the end the ladies were all presented with a folder containing a photo and our souvenir menu, as well as a rose. We really enjoyed the evening.

It was a brilliant end to an amazing day!

Bill and I had a wonderful time at Anan Creek. It really was one of the highlights of our trip and we would do it again - when we next go to Alaska, we will definitely do this again!

Josh dropped us back into town at the rain guage, and we walked up to see the Salmon Ladder. There were so many salmon in the water! We then walked down Married Man Trail to Creek Street and walked along the boardwalk by the houses on stilts in the water. We saw a seal chasing salmon, he was incredibly quick!

Salmon at the Salmon Ladder:

Bill walking down Married Man's Trail:

We had about 2 hours watching the bears, and then it was time to go. But I felt that we had had great bear viewing and an amazing experience! We got our group together and headed back down the trail. We saw a really sweet little squirrel on the way! because the tide had come in, we had to walk further back to another landing spot where Michelle was to pick us up. She landed and put two plastic stepping stools in the water for us to walk on so we did not get wet feet. Before long we were back in Ketchikan! At the dock, we were amazed to see how far up the tide had come! The pilons that had been uncovered before were now completely submerged!

Michelle arriving - gliding past the ranger's house. They live on the water so they don't have too much impact on the bears.

The hide is based on an honesty system, although I am sure the ranger keeps on eye on it as well. When it was our turn, we went down the stairs and had a great time watching the bears.

After our 30 minutes was up, we came back up to let someone else go down. If we had only waited 30 more seconds!! Just as we came back up to the main platform, a mother brought her cub down by the water to an area that was hidden from sight from the platform above but the people in the hide would have had perfect views of the adorable baby! We did get to see the baby as they moved away!

Mother and Baby!

Baby Bear!

The bears were fishing, it was so wonderful to see. The salmon were so plentiful, they would catch one, eat the skin, the head and the belly and throw the rest in the water and catch another. It was a bit gory with blood and fish eggs being squirted around, but fascinating to watch.

One bear would catch a fish, run up the hill into the trees to eat it and then come back down and catch another. Others would eat it where they caught it. Another had a big log that he used almost like a dining room table to eat his fish from. Some had short straight fur, some had longer fur and one had really long curly fur!

We mostly saw black bears, but we also saw two Grizzlies. Soon it was Bill’s and my turn to go down into the hide. We went down some stairs and were almost at eye level with the bears! We got some great photos, and it was just lovely to be able to see these wild bears doing something that was so essential to their survival.

We stopped for this bear to cross our path:

We arrived at the viewing platform and our guide made eye contact with the Park Ranger to make sure it was safe. We then walked through a wooden gate into the enclosure and we were ready for a few hours of bear watching. There were about 30 people already at the platform (Anan gives out around 60 passes per day) and Josh encouraged us to sign up right away for our 30 minute spot in the downstairs hide.

We then started watching the bears!

Bears near the lookout:

A bear near the toilet!

On arrival, we all had to step out onto the plane floats, walk to the end and jump onto the rocky beach. No one got wet feet. Our guide then spoke about how we would walk up to the viewing platform and that we all had to stay together in a tight group. We could stop and take photos at the beginning of the hike, but we had to ask, and if one stopped, we all stopped. He had a huge rifle, a smaller gun and bear spray. We then walked up to the park ranger hut where the ranger gave us a safety talk and a general list of do’s and dont’s. She got a call to say that there were some whales coming along, so we all walked back down to the beach and saw a couple of whales swimming by. But I was anxious to get up to the bears!!

There was one toilet down by the beach, and as we would be up at the viewing platform for a few hours, we all used it. It was a really dirty dropbox, and smelt really bad. I think it is the worst toilet I have ever been in and I have been in some bad bathrooms all over the world. The park ranger said that there was a similar toilet up by the viewing platform, but if you went in there, and a bear came up, you would need to stay in the toilet until the bear left! I did not want to risk being trapped in the toilet!

Then we were on our way! The hike is really easy, mostly wooden pathways on platforms and took about 20 minutes. The surrounding scenery was really beautiful. We could see at least 50 Bald Eagles sitting on the river bed below us feasting on the fish carcasses that were making their way down from the river above. We stopped to watch a young bear wade our into the river below us, grab a fish carcass and run off into the trees! It was really fantastic! After a little more walking, we had to stop as a bear was crossing the oath in front of us!! We let it pass and continued in our way. Once we got to a certain point, our guide said we could not stop to take photos until we were safely in the lookout.

Bye Michelle! Waving goodbye to the plane:

The start of the hike:

A young bear eating fish carcasses:

Bear and Eagles:

We were driven the short distance to the Island Wings office, and were encouraged to use the facilities (I am so glad I did as the facilities at Anan Creek are incredibly stinky and awful - more on that later). Our plane landed and tied up at the dock.

The dock was a floating dock that could obviously go up and down with the tides. The tide was really low, and we were fascinated by the sea animals clinging to the wooden poles holding up the building above. There were lots of jellyfish, star fish and anemones. We also saw a lazy seal cruising among the pilons looking for things to eat.

The pilot Michelle seated us in the plane, she looked us over and you could see she was assessing our size and weight as to where to place us. Our guide squeezed in with us. Our bags were placed in a compartment in the floats of the sea plane. And we were off! The scenery was beautiful, and Michelle provided a brief commentary as we went along.

I think this is a small Lions Mane Jellyfish, with other little white jellyfish:

Low tide before the flight:

High tide after the flight!

Little crabs and sea creatures!

Taking off past our ship!

Bill in front of the seaplane at Anan Creek, Michelle in the water and our guide off to the side.

Wednesday 30 July - We had arrived in Ketchikan and I was so excited!! Our entire trip had been built around this day - a visit to Anan Creek National Park to see bears fishing! When I first started researching our visit to Alaska, I came across photos of bears fishing at Anan Creek National Park, and decided it was a must do. I contacted Island Wings to ask their advice on the best dates to visit, and then booked 30 July with them. http://www.islandwings.com/bear-viewing-tours.

While waiting to disembark, we had breakfast then roamed around the deck taking photos of the town. At 9am we could leave the ship, and we had to be back on by 5.45pm.

The day started off a bit grey and drizzly, but it cleared up very quickly and we had wonderful clear weather. We were so lucky, as the day before the weather was so bad they had to cancel the flight to Anan Creek!

We had a little time before we were picked up from the port by our guide, so we took photos of the ‘Welcome to Ketchikan’ sign, the rain gauge and other interesting things around the dock. Our driver and guide arrived, and there were 2 other couples already in the van who were staying in town. The 6 of us were in for a great day.

I am enjoying your review. We will be on the Millennium next June and we have booked a whale watching trip with Misty Bay Lodge. Thank you for taking the time to write this review!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Glad you are enjoying it! I hope you have a wonderful day whale watching with Misty Bay.

Yvette, your pictures and review are terrific!

 

We visited Alaska last Aug and were able to see some of the same sights in Denali,Anchorage and Seward so that brings back happy memories for us. Unfortunately, our scheduled Millenium cruise did not leave Seward due to a propulsion issue as scheduled and we missed all of the inside passage ports. We are signed up to go next year. Looking at your pictures gets us more excited to see all of the ports we missed from last year!

 

Thanks so much for taking the time to do this great and detailed review!

I am sorry you were caught up in the problems that Millennium had last year. I read about the people that missed their cruises and felt bad for them. But you do have a wonderful adventure ahead of you, I hope you have a fantastic cruise next year!

Thank you Yvette. I love following this thread. It's not a review - it's like reading a good book. Thank you for taking the time.

Thank you VermeulT, I am glad you are enjoying my story!

I just wanted you to know that I am very jealous of your whale sightings...and even MORE jealous of the great photos you were able to get!! They sure did put on a show for you!!

 

Thanks so much for the time it takes to do a review like this. I now find that I just skim through reviews that are "all words", but one like yours I read completely and take time to look at each and every photo. I am always anxious to check online each morning to see if you have posted anything new!

 

Just FYI for you...or anyone else who does a photo review. I used Picasa to edit my cruise photos and then it was an easy "one click" to post them online to Google+ so they could be used in my photo review of our Alaskan cruise. So far I have not had any issues with exceeding bandwidth on the site and have not had to pay anything.

AryMay, thanks,yes our one whale was a bit of a show off! The noise he made when he landed in the water each time was so loud! Good advice about Picassa, I will keep that in mind. I will have a look at your photos too!

It had been a long and busy day. We had really enjoyed the whale watch, but the bear watch was a bit uncomfortable. I did really enjoy the views from the beach and hiking by the river to see the glimpse of the bear. The sighting of the deer was also lovely. The bear tour would have been a lot better if we had not been so squished in the van.

We showered and got ready for dinner, and actually made it to our first ever elite Captain’s Club cocktail hour! The drinks were served from 5pm till 7pm, and we walked in and introduced ourselves to Lionel, the Captain’s Club Host. He was really nice and friendly. They had quite a good range of drinks on offer, and I ordered a Side Car. I am not sure what was in it but it was lemony and very delicious. We had met a lovely couple at the wine tasting earlier in the week, and we joined them along with friends they had made, a mother and her adult daughter. The 6 of us had a lovely two hours talking about what we had been up to during the cruise.

We went to the aerial/acrobatic show called ‘No net, just passionate hearts’. This show was really very good. The performers, Jocka and Maria, were exceptionally strong, flexible and graceful. They did a lot of aerial acrobatics and even swung out over the audience. We had a light meal in the buffet, and then it was time for bed. Our room was just above the sunset bar, so every night as we went up I would make a cup of tea in the buffet, then climb the outside stairs from the sunset bar up to our room. It was very convenient!

We had an envelope in our door, which is not unusual. There are always invitations to the art auctions and sales in the boutiques on board. But this was a special envelope!!! It was an invitation to dine with the Captain the next evening on the last formal night!!! We were pretty excited. I know some people think dining at the Captain’s Table is not exciting, but we felt really special!!!!

We slept very well after our day out in Hoonah.

Before our bear watch ended, we saw this Sitka Black-Tailed Deer family

We were dropped off back at Icy Strait Point around 2.45pm, and we stopped at the donut shop on the advice from cruise critic to try the maple donuts. They were nice. We knew we would be back again the following week, so we returned back to the ship.

The Donut shop!

Zip Liners!

Our driver took us to where he though the bear was, and we hopped out again and walked along the banks of a river:

We saw the bear, the bear saw us - and ran into the woods as fast as it could!

Salmon Berry!

Blue Berry!

Another view of Icy Strait Point:

Back in Hoonah, we picked up our bagged lunches from the cafe, and then set out in a van with Hope’s brother to search for bears. There originally was only going to be the 6 of us in the van, but another 4 people had booked that day. There were now 10 of us in the van and I think that was too many. We were squished and uncomfortable and it was a long afternoon.

Also, the people in the back could not hear anything that the driver was saying as he did not have a microphone. We drove around and around but did not see any wildlife at all. We stopped to walk down a rocky beach and saw a bear far away in the distance. Our guide thought he knew where the bear was walking to, so we got back in the van and drove to another area were we got out and walked down by the water. The bear was there, still quite a distance away, and as soon as it saw us it ran back into the trees. We did see some Bald Eagles and also a mother Sitka Black-Tailed deer with two babies that were very sweet.

Views from our bear watch. We had been driving around for a while, then we got out of the bus and walked down to the beach.

While on the beach we saw this bear! I know, you can hardly see it, but there is a bear on the beach in the distance!

Bye, Whale! Thanks for a great show!

On the way back to Hoonah, we saw these two bear cubs playing on the beach! They were very far away, but we could see then wrestling with each other and frolicking around. They ran into the grass after a minute.

Bill took this photo of a Bald Eagle with a fish. When we got back home and were looking at the photos, we realised there was a Dall Porpoise in the photo as well (see second eagle photo), and we had not seen him at all! We had been so busy watching the Bald Eagle! In another photo you can just see the Porpoise's head poking out of the water.

Eagle and Porpoise!

Seals!!

It was so thrilling to see the whale breaching!

Tuesday 29 July - Today we were in Icy Strait Point/Hoonah. It was overcast and cool, but we had no rain. The ship was tendered but there was no need for tender tickets as we arrived so early. We got off the ship at 7am and the last tender was at 3.30pm. Icy Strait Point is an attraction consisting of shops, restaurants, museums, walks and a zipline which is owned by a native corporation and is open when cruise ships are in port. Hoonah is the nearby town.

I had booked a combination Whale Watch and Bear Viewing trip with Misty Bay Lodge, a cafe/hotel which also runs excursions http://www.mistybaylodge.com. We were picked up from Icy Strait Point by Hope, one of the owners of the Lodge, and driven the short distance into Hoonah.

We then set out with Hope’s Husband Captain Dan for our whale watch excursion. 4 other people were on the boat with us, a lovely couple from our roll call that we had spent time with onboard, and two sisters travelling together.

It was incredibly foggy out on the water and I was not sure if we would see anything at all. But the fog cleared and we came across one whale. But he was a very, very active whale, leaping right out of the water multiple times, doing lots of tail slaps and waving his flippers around in the air. We stayed and watched him until it was time to head back to Hoonah and go on our bear search.

A Juvenile Bald Eagle on the nest:

This is the boat we went out on:

Hoonah:

Millennium dwarfing Icy Strait Point:

Hi Cornishpastyman1 - I love the word 'faffing'!!

Thank you for your very kind words, you have made me smile, and I am encouraged to keep on going. I just finished resizing the photos for the next instalment, so will do another port! Yvette :)

Loving your review Yvette! Thanks so much for taking the time to do it. I log in every day hoping for the next instalment. There are many reviews out there, but yours is so comprehensive, and being from Aussie as well, and going on the same ship, it's that much more relevant for me.

 

We are doing Northbound on Millennium in May, with 3 nights post cruise somewhere Seward/Kenai/Anchorage, haven't gotten that far in the planning yet, but you are a mine of great information. Then 4 nights in Honolulu on the way home for some warm weather before getting back into the Melbourne winter.

Hi Cassicruiser, you are in for a treat, Alaska is so beautiful! I am just resizing the next lot of photos, and then will probably post again in the morning. Thanks for your comments, they are appreciated. Yvette