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

[John&LaLa]

Just now, xpcdoojk said:

OK, apparently, I have used my limit on posting....  which seems strange...  

 

jc

That's odd, what does the My Attachments folder in your profile say?

[xpcdoojk]

So, since, I am now apparently in picture timeout.  I will continue my review.

 

Sunday September 2, 2018 we arrived in Juneau (the capital of Alaska) to which you can’t drive to.  It is separated by a massive ice field. 

 

Sometime last summer someone posted a glowing review of a lady captain taking them whale watching in Juneau, so I contacted that operator, and she told me she was shutting down for the season a week before we were to arrive in Juneau, but she recommended a couple of other operators that she said were just like hers.  So, I contacted Alaska Humpback adventures, Steve was the captain, and it turns out that he is the brother of the lady captain.  He was a quite fascinating fellow, as he is an ordained Presbyterian Minister, and Shelby way back in his hippie days in the 60s was also in the seminary.  He fell from grace and ended up working for the Great satan... the federal government.  Anyway Steve arranged to pick us up at the port  at 9:30AM and drove us about 30 minutes north to the harbor where he keeps his boat, it would be a 4 hour tour with 3 of it on the water.  It was $700 for the 5 of us.  Have I mentioned Alaska is expensive?  

 

We had an amazing trip, he was a great guy, who really knew his craft.  Many of our cruise passengers were on gigantic boats, with large crowds, we were on a 30 foot open bow cabin outboard with twin 250HP motors. It was a very solid boat.  We were listening on the radio to other captains telling where they were and what whales they were seeing.  Steve had a poster in the cabin with about 50 whales, and how to know which whale was which whale.  Each of the whales that come to this bay do it year after year and they identify primarily by the markings on their tales.  He asked us if we had ever seen the whales in Alaska or Hawaii.  We said we have seen them on a tour in Hawaii.  He then explained their behavior in Alaska is quite different from Hawaii.  In Alaska, they basically eat and sleep.  When they sleep they turn off half of their brain, and float, which makes them vulnerable to being hit by boats.  Then when they eat, they typically do three or four breaches where they breath to catch their breath from the last deep dive, then when they are ready for the terminal dive where they will go down to eat for 6 to 9 minutes typically.  You spot them on the pre-terminal dive breaches by their spraying mist into the sky.  

 

We saw about a dozen whales in about 3 or 4 different spots, we also, saw a lot of harbor seals many of them quite close.  I will post a compilation video later.  After the tour we headed back to the harbor where the shore line was covered with hundreds of bald eagles.  Steve informed us that the eagles don’t get their white head until they are about 5 years old.  Juvenile Eagles are quite vulnerable apparently.  While we were using the fascilities there was a large eagle in a nearby tree, when he used his fascilities I quickly realized you would not want to be in the path of that!  

 

Steve dropped us off at the airport where we picked up a Chrysler Pacifica for the rest of our day in Juneau.  Our plan was to go to Tracy’s Crab Shack, which was right at the pier next to the ship, and it was packed.  He told us there was a pop up version of Tracy’s a half mile away in an outdoor area.  So, we went to it, but apparently it was closed, so we ended up at lunch at the Hanger on the Wharf, as it was a bit further away and we could get immediate seating.  We had either the halibut and chips or halibut tacos.  The food was fresh, since I was driving I had an iced tea but the others sampled the local beers which they seemed to enjoy.  

 

After lunch we drove back past the airport and went to Mendenhall Glacier.  We walked the trail and took lots of pictures.  Where we parked the car a small creek was full of spawning salmon that had turned a bright red.  This was a cool bonus.  After viewing the glacier, I dropped the gang off at the ship drove back to the airport but a couple of gallons of gas in it before catching a cab back to the ship.  I texted the DW that I was on my way and we should walk the tourist walk of shops.  We did but didn’t really see anything that we needed other than some postcards, and we got back on the ship about 7:30.  

 

After a quick shower and change we went first to the DL which was not nearly as crowded as the earlier nights, then about 20 minutes before dinner we joined Sue and Shelby in the CL.  I think they turned diamond after this cruise, will be interesting if they will only continue booking full suites or not.  What am I saying how could Sue survive without a private concierge.  We had my time dining at 8:45PM, for some reason they seated us in a different section from the first night and they set us in this section the rest of the cruise when we dined in the main dining room.  It was disco inferno night and we were too tired (err I was too tired) to do anything but watch for a few minutes before going to bed as we hit the dock in Skagway the next morning at 7AM and DW, Sally and I were doing the White Pass Railway and Skagway highlights tour at 8AM in the morning.

 

jc

[xpcdoojk]

49 minutes ago, John&LaLa said:

That's odd, what does the My Attachments folder in your profile say?

 

 

You have used 6.96 MB of your 488.28 MB attachment limit.

 

Some of the pixies go back to 2008.  Like I said, I don’t know why it shut me down but shut me down it did.

 

jc

[John&LaLa]

33 minutes ago, xpcdoojk said:

 

 

You have used 6.96 MB of your 488.28 MB attachment limit.

 

Some of the pixies go back to 2008.  Like I said, I don’t know why it shut me down but shut me down it did.

 

jc

Mine reads 19 MB going back to 2010.

 

Are your new pics showing up in the Attachment list?

 

Carry on.  I was enjoying the pictures though.  Reading a review that just posted 59 pics in one post. 

[xpcdoojk]

It was a bright clear morning in Skagway, and we got off the ship at about 7:45AM after a breakfast in the WJ.  Sue and Shelby were meeting some Iditarod competitor that was taking them to her kennel to spend the days learning all about sledding, dogs and the race.  While I love dogs, I didn’t really need any more exposure than the free exposure we had in Denali.  The lady’s name is Michelle Phillips who finished 9th in 2017.  

 

Anyway, back to the bus that took us to a theatre in Skagway, where a guy dressed in turn of the 20th century garb talked to us about the gold rush, and showed us a short movie.  After the 10 minute presentation we loaded back up in the bus and drove to Canada.  Where the train was waiting after doing the trip out on the train.  We boarded the train and did the reverse run back into Skagway.  I am sure there are tons of people describing this tour so I won’t bother doing it again.  But it was a nice experience and I could imagine with snow around even in summer what it had to be like in the Tormented Valley in January 1898.  On the bus ride, we passed a small black bear cub literally on the side of the road. I got a decent short video of it as it scampered off the road and up the grade beside the road out of site.  

 

Returning to Skagway we walked the streets of the old town, went to a couple of souvineer shops and not seeing any awesome restaurants we had lunch back on the ship in the MDR.  After lunch we had booked thru the cruise the Ocean Raft Wildlife adventure.  This was a lot of fun, but the wildlife is pretty much minimal, a few eagles and maybe a harbor seal.  The adventure part of this was pretty fun.  First they picked us up in a small bus and drove us about 200 yards to a warehouse next to the harbor where we put our stuff in big plastic tub, and then put on gigantic ocean survival suits.  Felt like an Apollo astronaut in prison orange.  Then we walked about 200 feet to the pier where a very large zodiac with horse saddle seats and 3 300 horse power outboard engines was sitting.  We loaded in, I went to the front on the side, the girls being cautious went further back on the side.  Our crew was two young women, the older was the captain, and she was about 30 the other was our naturalist who described the adventure and the natural things who was probably about 25.  

 

The captain, slowly powered out past the pier when she gunned it.  We were speeding along at about 50 mph maybe a bit more possibly, when she started doing tight 360 degree turns.  The naturalists encouraged us to do a rodeo hand which would encourage the captain to be even more dramatic.  Of course, I imediately did rodeo hands enthusiastically.  It reminded me of the trip to South America and specifically where we did a zodiac (lot less horsepower) right up under the falls at Iquazzu, where we got completely drenched, which did not endear us to the rest of the passengers who in that case were French nationals.  As someone who grew up with boats including boats capable of 100+ these things are always tame touristy things to me, but my two ladies had a great time and both described it as a highlight.  It was about two hours riding up along one side and back down the other side of the fjord.  Lots of waterfalls and high speed boat turns good times.  

 

JC

[xpcdoojk]

52 minutes ago, John&LaLa said:

Mine reads 19 MB going back to 2010.

 

Are your new pics showing up in the Attachment list?

 

Carry on.  I was enjoying the pictures though.  Reading a review that just posted 59 pics in one post. 

 

 

Yes sir.

 

jc

[John&LaLa]

I'm confused, when and where did you get on the ship?  Something seems missing

[xpcdoojk]

Seward

[John&LaLa]

3 minutes ago, xpcdoojk said:

Seward

My bad, I got lost when you started posting pics of the RV portion 

[xpcdoojk]

1 hour ago, John&LaLa said:

My bad, I got lost when you started posting pics of the RV portion 

 

You really should memorize my important words from a month ago.  Very disappointing.

 

jc

[xpcdoojk]

Obviously after a little time it would again let me post pictures.  

 

These are from the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center in Girdwood, or at the end of the bay that separates the Kenai Penisula from the mainland.  The first one is a male bull moose in full rut.  He was a bit adjitated to say the least.  The brown bear was massive.  

 

The last was my last view of the RV in the parking lot in Seward.  You can notice the Radiance of the Seas in the background.  The parking situation is unlike any cruiseship terminal I have ever seen anywhere in the world.  I intentionally parked at the farthest distance from the terminal to make it easy for the man picking it up to find it.  

 

JC

Edited October 19, 2018 by xpcdoojk

[John&LaLa]

On 8/22/2018 at 1:02 PM, xpcdoojk said:

I thought I would really frustrate myself  John and post our trip when I know the internet CC 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 home packing for Symphony. 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 months.

 

Ciao

 

JC

Love the new quoting features😉🍷

[xpcdoojk]

1 and 2 are of the Hubbard Glacier from about a half mile away.  It looked closer.

3 and 4 are bald eagles covering the shoreline before we left on the whale watching tour in Aiken Bay.  Litterally hundreds of them on the shore and in the trees.  You can see some of the immature ones are starting to get their white heads.  

 

JC

[xpcdoojk]

I am again cut off from uploading pictures.  Love the new web site....

 

jc

[A&L_Ont]

JC, when you were at the animal reserve did you see the lynx in the large enclosure? It took me a few minutes but I did see it. I sure smelt it. 

[xpcdoojk]

Yes, we saw the lynx, he didn’t smell as bad as the porcupine.  

[A&L_Ont]

8 minutes ago, xpcdoojk said:

Yes, we saw the lynx, he didn’t smell as bad as the porcupine.  

I’ll have to go back to see the porcupine now.  The wolves were sleeping when we were there. The earthquake forest was cool too.  

[xpcdoojk]

We departed Skagway about 5:30PM and we had MTD at 8:15 we did our normal DL CL visits, and after dinner we went to the Aurora theatre to watch the headliner show.  We were able to actually get seats because we didn’t have to rush to the theatre after dinner because it was at 10:15PM.  They were called Wilde and James, they were funny. About all I remember.

 

The next day we arrived at Icy Strait Point / Hoonah village at 6:30AM.  Fortunately, we didn’t have to meet our tour until 9AM.  We booked with Hoonah Travel Adventures separate from the cruiseline and we paid $325 for a Honda 1000 4 wheeler that seated 5.  Which was a real value compared to booking with RCI.  We were picked up just outside of the RCI compound, and driven about 3 or 4 miles away to a small shop where the four wheelers and some jeeps were stored.  They give you a GPS and bear spray.  The Bear spray is completely unnecessary and the GPS didn’t actually show any roads outside of the main roads and since you are off driving on logging trails and other single track trails it was worthless.  On the upside the 4 wheeler operated well other than having a bit of a misalignment issue and it was actually quite quick as I found out later in the tour.  

 

They basically give you a bad map and say, bear have been seen here and here, go along this road and go here.  Which without a lay of the land means virtually nothing to me.  So, off we go and amazingly we found the landmarks they mentioned.  After about 30 minutes of going to the spots they mentioned we ventured off into uncharted (by the GPS) territory.  Since there was no GPS reference, I just made sure when we came to a trail that had two branches that I tried to sort of memorize.  After a while I had made so many small decisions that I was pretty certain, I would get lost on the return.  At one point we came around a corner to see a brown bear in the middle of the trail, it immediately ran like heck and vacated the trail and dissappeared off the side down the hill into the brush.  I think we saw the bear for all of about 10 seconds.  

 

We saw some lovely views from a hillside of the bay, and the shoreline.  After a while we were beside a river looking for salmon (didn’t see any) watching about a half dozen eagles sitting in the trees, and I was contemplating if I should try to cross the shallow river to the other side, when my cell phone started ringing.  Hmm, I answer it and apparently we were 10 minutes overdue.  I said, O I am sorry I thought we had it until 12:30he said no 12.  We were already about 10 minutes late for that.  So, we start back, with branches whipping the 4 wheeler and I went flying thru these tiny trails. Reaching speeds of about 45 miles an hour, amazingly I didn’t make a single mistake and was back on the main dirt roads, and hit about 60mph before we got back on the paved road on the edge of town where the speed limit dropped to 30 or less further in.  We got back about 12:30PM.  The operator I was worried was going to ding me for an overage, but he just smiled and called the van to take us back to the village and the RCI compound.  Good times.  The 4 wheeler ride back to town while I was late where I could go full bore was the best part of the trip to Alaska to me.  I am a bad person.

 

The Icy Strait Point visitor center is actually very nice, as we looked at all of the little shops and stuff, but other than using the facilities we didn’t buy anything significant, and after watching the zipline the empties there for 20 minutes with my very talkative Australian friend from the DL nothing happened.  I finally asked an employee so how long does it take to do that, and he told me a bus left about 20 minutes before and it took them about 45 minutes to get to the top, and the ride lasts for about 90 seconds or less.  I am sure it is fun, but it is an expensive very short bit of fun.

 

We decided to eat back on the ship, in the main dining room.  Since it was formal night, and I didn’t know before we went we decided that we didn’t want to do formal night in the main dining room so we sent Shelby off to get us a reservation at Giovanni’s for dinner.  We spent our regular time in the DL and CL and then went to Giovannis at 6:30PM where we had a very lovely meal, the place was about 1/4 filled.  After dinner we went to the Aurora Theatre for another headliner show starring Mario and Daniel at 8:45PM.  We were able to get seats again, and it was another enjoyable funny show.  

 

JC

[xpcdoojk]

36 minutes ago, A&L_Ont said:

I’ll have to go back to see the porcupine now.  The wolves were sleeping when we were there. The earthquake forest was cool too.  

 

The wolves were sleeping on their houses when we went by them, too.  

[xpcdoojk]

Hey it is letting me post more pictures....  silly web site.

 

Anyway, the first is a glacier they are everywhere in Alaska as seen from the whale watching boat. I don’t think it is Mendenhall but I am not sure.  

 

The second is a whale do pre terminal dive breather.  The third the whale is finishing a terminal dive as is the 4th.  The 5th harbor seals doing what they do when they are not eating.  

 

[xpcdoojk]

A whale doing its terminal dive, you can see how you could identify them by the markings on the tail. We saw shots like this many times.  Excellent whale watching experience.

 

jc

[xpcdoojk]

1. Is a picture of the spawning salmon in the river beside the road where we parked to go to the Mendenhall glacier visitor center. 

2.  Nugget Falls.

3. Mendenhall Glacier from the trail

4.  She who must be obeyed, or at least thinks she is being obeyed.

5  Ladies in front of Nugget Falls.

 

[xpcdoojk]

1.  Is the small black bear cub beside the road on the bus ride to Fraser Canada to catch the train.

2.  Juneau harbor, earlier in the day there were 5 ships in port.  Now just us a view from our aft balcony.

3.  Train going around a corner.  

[xpcdoojk]

Picture of the original bridge that is apparently one of the engineering masterpieces of all time.  At least that is what we were told.  

 

2 is another glacier, they litterally are everywhere.  I don’t think we have an immediate worry about loss of glaciers.  Some are growing some are shrinking, but we seem to have plenty.

 

3 a river viewed from the train.  Lovely.

 

4 

 

5 apparently the train regularly picks up backpackers at at least two designated points.  I spent most of the ride on the platform outside of the car, and we stopped twice to let groups of backpackers get on the train.  

 

We were inspected coming over from Canada by some very serious border agents.  I am thinking outside of the backpackers the train picked up, there really isn’t anyone to worry about on the train.  Still we had to hold our passports up by our face as he walked down the aisle.  I remember a similar experience on the Danube entering into Hungary from Serbia.... there it seemed a little more realistic.  Watched the last hour of the Bridge of Spies tonight and so yeah this felt a little like that.  

 

JC

[xpcdoojk]

4 timed out another view of the bridge and five....