Jump to content

Live from the Radiance of the Seas August 31, 2018 to Seward to Vancouver


Recommended Posts

I thought I would really frustrate myself and post our trip when I know the internet is going to be horrible.

 

We are a bit early for the cruise and are flying to San Francisco to spend a few nights for business at the Silverado Resort and Spa in Napa, before flying to Anchorage and renting an RV for 5 adults for 5 nights, pre-cruise. I know I am insane.

 

We are currently in Denver at the United Airlines Lounge. It is nice enough, but I have been spoiled by the Centurion Lounges we usually try to visit on our travels. The wines are on par with the DL.:')

 

Will post more over the next 2-1/2 weeks.

 

Ciao

 

JC

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So day 2 from the Silverado Resort was off to a bit of a bad start. Our flight from Denver to SFO was greatly delayed for no obvious reason and by the time we reached Silverado it was after 10PM, and since I had been awake at that point for about 20 hours, I decided I wouldn't try to make my 8AM tee time, so my round on the North course went by the board. We drove into Napa instead and ate at Alexis Baking Company and I had lemon ricotta pancakes and bacon and it was simply awesome. We wasted some time driving around before returning to the resort so I could attend a work conference. We had a cocktail party and then we went Napa to eat at Torc which is a really yummy restaurant we had the fixed menu with wine pairings, I had the heirloom tomatoes with Buratta cheese starter, the pork belly and the final course of cheese and crudo the courses were paired with a French Rose, a Napa Cab and finally a Grgich Hills dessert wine (yum).

 

Day 3 more meetings, before a driving tour up the valley over to Santa Rosa and then back down the Sonoma valley before back here at the resort. We are having dinner tonight at the Grove here. We ate lunch in St. Helena at Gott's Roadside, which is a vintage burger joint on the side of the road that is part roadside burger joint and fancy wine bar. We joined probably a 150 people eating lunch on the lovely backyard.

 

Tomorrow I have another meeting, then we drive after lunch back to San Francisco to return the rental car, and catch a flight to Seattle on Delta before another flight to Anchorage. Hopefully traffic won't be as bad Saturday afternoon as it was Wednesday night. It was horrible. I always forget why despite how lovely it is here, that I will never live in California.

 

jc

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Day 4 more work. Finished that at 10:30AM back to the room to finish packing. I was a little early and Krystal had just gotten out of the shower, so a small delay. Finally we left and I put the John Muir Wood in the Iphone map, and took off. We have visited the redwood trees there in the past, but now, they have instituted parking reservations, and of course they don’t put any signs up until you are at the parking lot almost down the steep twisting road, that you are not welcome. That is new since 2006 on our last trip here. Sigh, so, turn around and back up the mountain.

 

Got to SFO and dropped rental car, train to Delta Terminal, drop bags ask the lady at the bag drop if we could get to the Centurion lounge from this terminal without going back thru security, and were told no, we would have to go thru security 2 times. So, we used our card to go to the Delta Sky Lounge. The Delta lounge is one of the few that is still associated with Amex, as AA no longer is. Turns out it is not bad. We just finished lunch and a glass of wine. Lunch was not as good as Centurion but adequate. I had a salad with chicken, clam chowder, and pita chips and humus. Now we settle down for our flight boarding in a little over an hour. Our friends flying from home should be landing in Anchorage about the time we take off here.

 

Next stop is Sea-Tac, another couple of hours in a lounge then Anchorage at almost midnight Anchorage time.

 

Tomorrow, I get to drive a giant RV, hopefully not in snow!!!!!

 

JC

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So we are at Big Bear RV in Palmer after 3 nights in Teklanika Camp in Denali, there is no internet or electricity or anything there. We saw dozens of Grizzlies, lots of Caribou, a Golden Eagle, 50 Dall sheep, a brown bear. It was mostly rainy and foggy in Denali, we never saw the mountain while in the park until this morning leaving, when we saw a small part leaving rthe park then a lot of it on the road back to Wasilla. I will fill in the parts later, if we have internet. Driving the RV has been oK mostly. Just taking my time. Tonight we had pork chops on the tiny barbecue. We have been watching the white Queen in the RV, i think we are up to episode 5.

 

Tek Camp was an interesting place, we could run the generator from 8-10 in the morning, and 4-8 in the evening. The day we went to wonder lake we didn’t get hone until 6pm. Which meant the battery wa pretty low. Tomorrow, we have to dump the grey water... can’t wait.... not

 

J C

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So, quick update we are now on the ship. We got here just before noon, check in for us DPlus was about 10 minutes, check-in for our friend who is gold was about 12 minutes, our other friends in a grand suite was about 8 minutes.

 

The RV adventure is over, we parked the car in the lot and locked the keys in it. They will pick it up sometime today.

 

Sailaway scheduled for 8PM and our my time dining at 8:45PM. We did have our D+ amenities in the cabin, a bottle of Sav Blanc and a couple of Coronas.

 

Will fill in details tonight or tomorrow.

 

Ciao.

 

JC

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi JC, looking forward to following along. We’re not that far away, relatively, in Calgary, Canada. Have fun. Xxx

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

What brings you and John to this side of the pond?

 

It is rainy and cool today as we are sailing towards Hubbard Glacier.

 

JC

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I thought I would really frustrate myself and post our trip when I know the internet is going to be horrible.

 

We are a bit early for the cruise and are flying to San Francisco to spend a few nights for business at the Silverado Resort and Spa in Napa, before flying to Anchorage and renting an RV for 5 adults for 5 nights, pre-cruise. I know I am insane.

 

We are currently in Denver at the United Airlines Lounge. It is nice enough, but I have been spoiled by the Centurion Lounges we usually try to visit on our travels. The wines are on par with the DL.:')

 

Will post more over the next 2-1/2 weeks.

 

Ciao

 

JC

Arrivaderci.

Looking forward to your review.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Day 4 more work. Finished that at 10:30AM back to the room to finish packing. I was a little early and Krystal had just gotten out of the shower, so a small delay. Finally we left and I put the John Muir Wood in the Iphone map, and took off. We have visited the redwood trees there in the past, but now, they have instituted parking reservations, and of course they don’t put any signs up until you are at the parking lot almost down the steep twisting road, that you are not welcome. That is new since 2006 on our last trip here. Sigh, so, turn around and back up the mountain.

 

Got to SFO and dropped rental car, train to Delta Terminal, drop bags ask the lady at the bag drop if we could get to the Centurion lounge from this terminal without going back thru security, and were told no, we would have to go thru security 2 times. So, we used our card to go to the Delta Sky Lounge. The Delta lounge is one of the few that is still associated with Amex, as AA no longer is. Turns out it is not bad. We just finished lunch and a glass of wine. Lunch was not as good as Centurion but adequate. I had a salad with chicken, clam chowder, and pita chips and humus. Now we settle down for our flight boarding in a little over an hour. Our friends flying from home should be landing in Anchorage about the time we take off here.

 

Next stop is Sea-Tac, another couple of hours in a lounge then Anchorage at almost midnight Anchorage time.

 

Tomorrow, I get to drive a giant RV, hopefully not in snow!!!!!

 

JC

Sounds great, having to attend work meetings is a bit of a bummer.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

What brings you and John to this side of the pond?

 

 

 

It is rainy and cool today as we are sailing towards Hubbard Glacier.

 

 

 

JC

 

 

 

Our son lives in Calgary and is now a Canadian citizen. It’s his 40th birthday party weekend.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So, filling in the over looked parts, when we arrived at Seattle airport we had a minimal time between flights and we went to the nearest Centurion Lounge to our gate which was thankfully close. It was probably the worst Centurion Lounges I have visited, the better choices of liquor complimentary were probably the only upsides over the Delta Lounge, at this point I was not much interested in drinking. We did watch a bit of football (preseason) the lounge was pretty full, and after about an hour we went to catch our flight which was slightly delayed arriving in Anchorage right at midnight instead of 15 minutes before. We got our bags and the hotel shuttle Home2Suites by Hilton showed up and we were in our room before 1AM. We slept fairly well and after a breakfast around 9AM at the hotel we met up with our friends arranged for the hotel shuttle to take us to ABC Motorhomes near the airport and we started that process by 10:30AM (their website only says you can get your motorhome by 1PM. We did a way too abbreviated how to session with a young lady who was probably 20. She glossed over a few things we had to figure out later, but all in all we did pretty well with the RV.

 

Our RV was a 3170 Sunseeker which I believe is made by Forest River it was a 2018 model with about 23,000 miles on it.

 

We went to a Walmart Supercenter with a shopping list with plans to make each meal for 5 nights in the RV. This was complicated by the minimal set of cookware and utensils, and almost no seasonings (one forgets how important those are, but how impractical it is to buy 15 different spices that you might use 1 time or not at all). Since there were five of us. We bought a large pack of chicken breasts, a large 3 pound chuck steak, a 3 pound pack of bacon, a packet of mushroom ravioli, 2 bags of potato chips, assorted crackers, humus, carrots, onions, lettuce, spinach, box of pancake mix, syrup, gallon of milk, 1/2 gallon of OJ, case of water, 18 eggs, a box of oatmeal, 2 loaves of bread, 2 different sandwich meats, PB&J, mayo, mustard, and a few other items. The bill came to about $215 since it was a Sunday the liquor department didn’t open until 12 so we waited a few minutes before buying wine for the time we were on the RV.

 

Finally about 12:15 we are on the road to Denali, and I finally got the beast up to speed, it soon became apparent that the RV had a tire balance issue, as I approached 55 got very bad, but got better as I approached 65MPH. So, I figured the Sammy Hagar song was correct and “I can’t drive 55”. The trip to Denali is pretty long and on that Sunday it was mostly in the rain. At this point my wife was navigating, and because I play the music too loud, we drove the entire way to the park with it off. At the town outside of the park entrance we bought gas so that we would have a full tank to operate the generator since there would be no hookups at Teklanika Campground at the 29 mile mark of the road. We had stopped at a roadside park on the way to Denali for lunch of sandwiches and chips. Gas near Anchorage and Wasilla was about $315 per gallon but was almost $4 a gallon at the park. Shelby paid for gas, and his credit card cut him off at $100 everytime we filled up, but somehow sorta of miraculously that got us very close to full each time. We filled up 3 times plus the propane tank Friday morning in Seward before boarding the ship.

 

Shelby switched over to navigating after our lunch stop, and the girls began animated chatting in the back which would last for the entire trip until we left Seward (imagine that). Shelby and I grunted at each other a lot. We stopped at the visitor entrance and Shelby who had arranged our park stay went in to the office to get our permit to drive past Savage River to Tek and to get our Tek bus passes.

 

The road is paved until you reach Savage River where Park Rangers stop all vehicles continuing on the road and give you a ticket you place with scotch tape on the window signifying you could go to Tek in your own vehicle. The young lady ranger then quizzed us about everything including that we did indeed have enough food and water for the 3 nights that we would be at Tek when we couldn’t leave the park. That kind of makes you think slightly what the heck are we getting into but we are still full-speed ahead and damn the torpedos kind of folks, well I am, and since I was driving that is the way it would be. Immediately the nice paved park road turned to a fine grey gravel and if I thought the vibration at 55 was bad it was simply nothing compared to the park road which has a maximum speed of 35MPH which I rarely approached.

 

We, of course had our eyes scanning the vast roadside looking for animals. After about 3 miles we noticed a pair of parks buses parked with people leaning out the school bus windows with cameras and binoculars, so we pulled to the side of the road and really started scanning the road, soon I spotted about 300 yards a ways a big brown/blond thing that moved. I trained my binoculars on it and quickly realized it was a large Grizzly. We watched it for 20 minutes then one of the buses left, and we pulled up a couple of hundred yards close to the second bus, when the Grizzly decided to move. He went up the hillside and loped right beside our RV and then along side the bus and then across the road in front of the bus before disappearing into the bushes on the other side. Very Cool.

 

We got to our camp at about 7PM, Tek was pretty full and we found an empty space close to the vault toilet (yum), parked the RV, and I started cooking dinner. Which was a mushroom wine and lemon reduction sauce with small bits of chicken and large bits of spinach over the mushroom ravioli with French bread and a salad. I made the main, but we couldn’t figure out how to start the oven’s pilot light, so I heated the bread in a skillet on the small 3 burner stove top. It was not too bad for camping, but that was the first of several times where I wish I had some fresh or even dry spices or herbs.

 

We settled in for the night, which was quite enlightening for all.

 

JC

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Wal Mart wine [emoji3]

 

I could never get Laura on an adventure like this.

 

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

 

I imagine Shelby’s wife Sue might have a little Laura in her, but she worked in a man’s profession selling switchgear to electricians and she is a pit bull chiuahua so she convinces herself that she can do the rugged adventures. Until they get hard. Then she melts down. I try to make sure they don’t get too hard.

 

The Walmart wines were not too bad. Erath and Meomi Pinot Noir, Kim Crawford Sauvingnon Blanc, St. Michelle Cabernets, and Chilean red and an Argentinian Malbec. Selection was tolerable. Kind of a rough crowd in the small liquor department when they first opened.:')

 

JC

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We are sailing in to Juneau right now. We have a privately booked whale watching excursion booked it is quite pricey, and in a smallish boat since it is just us 5, hopefully it won’t get hard, after they will take us to the airport where I have a small minivan rented (Chrystler Pacifica) where we will go to Tracy’s Crab Shack for lunch, then up to Mendenhall Glacier for a hike. Dinner is not till just before sailaway so it should be a full day.

 

JC

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I imagine Shelby’s wife Sue might have a little Laura in her, but she worked in a man’s profession selling switchgear to electricians and she is a pit bull chiuahua so she convinces herself that she can do the rugged adventures. Until they get hard. Then she melts down. I try to make sure they don’t get too hard.

 

The Walmart wines were not too bad. Erath and Meomi Pinot Noir, Kim Crawford Sauvingnon Blanc, St. Michelle Cabernets, and Chilean red and an Argentinian Malbec. Selection was tolerable. Kind of a rough crowd in the small liquor department when they first opened.:')

 

JC

 

I was just pulling the chain. Wal Mart used to carry Cellar Master riesling. I miss that wine.

I think they got rid of the noon openings in FL

 

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I probably won’t have internet again with free time until the last sea day, so not sure how much I will be able to post until the last sea day. :eek:

 

Until then Ciao.

 

JC

Enjoy the adventures

 

Maybe you can find some free internet at Starbucks

 

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

Link to comment
Share on other sites

JC, following along too. Thinking of your land and cruise stops as we were just there. Wifi was decent for posting text only put near impossible for photos. When you approach the ports watch for cellular provider on your phone to switch from CELLATSEA (whatever RC calls it) and that’s when you should switch from wifi to it.

 

Enjoy Alaska.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share

  • Forum Jump
    • Categories
      • Welcome to Cruise Critic
      • New Cruisers
      • Cruise Lines “A – O”
      • Cruise Lines “P – Z”
      • River Cruising
      • ROLL CALLS
      • Digital Photography & Cruise Technology
      • Special Interest Cruising
      • Cruise Discussion Topics
      • UK Cruising
      • Australia & New Zealand Cruisers
      • Canadian Cruisers
      • North American Homeports
      • Ports of Call
      • Cruise Conversations
×
×
  • Create New...