Shadowmeboy's Suntastic 10-Night Alaskan Anniversary Cruise Adventure

[shadowmeboy]

As you will remember from previous reviews, I am an early riser. 

 

 

We had a time change overnight onto Alaskan Daylight Time. So its approximately 5:30 in the morning at this point.

 

 

I noticed a bunch of people up early this morning, compared to other mornings. I started talking with a few of them and they pretty much had one thing in common. They all lived on the east coast of the US or Canada. It makes sense, it would be 9:30 approximately back east. The loungers were all still put away as they were still squeegeeing the pool deck.

 

 

 

the Garden Cafe was getting ready to open at 6am.

 

 

 

 

 

 

My destination was the Great Outdoors!

 

 

 

[shadowmeboy]

We were pacing the Celebrity Solstice which left Seattle from Pier 91 on Friday.

 

 

They were due to dock in Ketchikan tomorrow morning though, while we were due into Juneau midafternoon.

 

 

 

 

 

With not much else to photograph, it was how many different ways can I photo graph the other ship?

 

 

Since we were transiting in fairly open water in the North Pacific Ocean, I was not expecting to get my first whale count of the trip this morning.

 

 

If you look closely you can just barely see the whale.

 

 

 

A flipper

 

 

Two more there

 

 

This one was slapping the water with both flippers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shadowmeboy]

 

Okay, back to photographing the other ship!

 

 

 

 

People started showing up in the Great Outdoors. 

 

 

The ship has diverted off to the far side of the Queen Charlotte Islands on its way to Ketchikan. We stayed outside of the Queen Charlotte's on our way to Juneau.

 

 

I recognize that ship! Good Morning Norwegian Encore!

 

 

 

 

Something new to photograph!

 

 

 

 

I wish the weather was slightly clearer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shadowmeboy]

Susan finally made her way out to the Great Outdoors and we dropped down to deck 5 via the aft elevators to head to breakfast in Seven Seas.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Half Grapefruit and and a spoonful of cottage cheese. 

 

 

Yogurt parfait

 

 

Analyzing my spoonful of cottage cheese

 

 

Eggs Benedict

 

 

Egg and Avocado Wrap

[shadowmeboy]

After breakfast, we headed back to the stateroom to drop everything we didn't need for our next activity.

 

Since we were Platinum status on this cruise, we got to go on the Latitudes Behind the Scenes Tour.

 

 

Waiting near the CruiseNext Desk on Deck 6 for the tour to start.

 

 

 

 

Our CruiseNext Representative

 

 

Theater Staff meeting us at the Theater Doors

 

 

Sound Booth

 

 

Sun Theater

 

 

Walking outside on the back of the Ship to get into the Theater Dressing room

 

 

Theater Dressing Room

 

 

 

Mending station for costumes

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shadowmeboy]

 

Backstage in the Theater

 

 

From the Theater we walked on deck 6 forward to mid ship.

 

 

 

 

 

We dropped down to Deck 4 and the I95.

 

 

We met the gentleman in charge of the laundry 

 

 

 

 

 

I had previously done the BTS tour on the Norwegian Bliss, so doing it on the Sun was cool to see the differences. The Sun definitely has a much smaller laundry, but its proportionally larger versus the size of the ship. The size of the Bliss to the size of its laundry makes it much tighter.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pressing and folding machine

 

[shadowmeboy]

 

 

Demonstrating how the pressing service works

 

 

Guest laundry machines 

 

 

 

It was great because on of the couples on the BTS had sent a bag of laundry down, and they were actually processing it while we were in the laundry.

 

Our next stop was the galley, but we had to ride in the dirty laundry lift. Are they trying to tell us something?

 

[shadowmeboy]

 

So our final stop on the tour was the main galley on deck 5. The main galley is located between Four Seasons, Seven Seas, and La Cucina.

 

 

You can see the taco bowls for the vegetarian taco bowl dish on the day two lunch menu on the counter.

 

 

One of the chefs gave us a explanation of what is what in the galley.

 

 

 

All the pictures of all the dishes from all the menus of MDR dinners. Remember there are 14 dinners on the dinner rotation in the MDR.

 

 

Then you have your 3 breakfast menus and 3 lunch menus

 

 

 

 

you can see the iceberg lettuce in the tub for wedge salads.

 

 

We were down in the galley just after breakfast finished. So each item on the menu will be at a different station, so you can see the picture of the eggs benedict hanging up there. So a server or assistant server would come grab an eggs benedict from that station for their table.

 

 

 

Bacon!

 

 

 

I want to commend the chefs in the galley. They do a fabulous job feeding everyone and making each dish be consistent from one plate to the next. 

 

 

With that we finished up our Behind The Scenes Tour.

[shadowmeboy]

We headed over to the Photo Gallery and did our package upgrade.

 

 

We always buy the Welcome Aboard plus Package before we come onboard.

 

 

Now, the price is not the $199 being platinum. 

 

 

Afterwards we headed back to the stateroom to drop off and pick off stuff.

 

 

We went down and talked to ShoreEx, because they changed the time of our White Pass train ride in Skagway. I wasn't happy, because it went to being right in the middle of the day. We were going to have lunch in town and explore, but with the time change that was going to not be possible. 

 

Not much they could do, but the ShoreEx assistant Manager did give discount refund as an apology for the change. 

 

 

So we went to the Garden Cafe and had a light lunch. The opening Art Auction was at 12:30 with registration starting at 12:00, so we needed to eat something before that.

 

 

We enjoyed our Art experience on the Encore, so we decided to participate on the Sun!

 

 

We had fun at the opening Art Auction and even bought something! We returned to the room to drop and pick up some stuff and headed towards the Great Outdoors.

 

 

Susan didn't appreciate this photo as she was fixing the shoe.

 

 

She made me take this one.

 

 

We had some time to relax, so why not enjoy the beautiful afternoon!

 

 

We were pacing a different ship now. This Cunard ship had started Friday (yesterday) from Vancouver, BC.

 

 

 

 

We got a midafternoon pick-me-up. We had a later reservation and didn't want to be starving at 5pm.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shadowmeboy]

 

The land behind the Cunard Ship is the Queen Charlotte Islands.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Practicing with the zoom lens!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finally it was time to head back to the stateroom and get changed for pictures and dinner!

[shadowmeboy]

 

We ended up taking photos around the same time as this couple and their two kids several times over the cruise. The little girl always had the cutest outfits on.

 

 

Photo Time!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dinner was at Moderno tonight!

 

 

 

Moderno is always one of my favorite Specialty restaurants to eat at.

 

 

 

My Salad Bar Plate

 

 

Caipirinha

 

 

Strawberry Caipirinha

 

 

Susan's Salad Bar Plate

 

Let me set the scene here at Moderno. We are a party of two at a two top table next to the window on the end closest to the entrance to the restaurant. We are surrounded by parties of 10 or more at the 7 closest tables. Our server is responsible for us and 3 or 4 of those tables of 10 plus.

 

We get our drinks and our water and start on our salads. we know the Moderno drill, so when we are ready our plates get cleared and the sides and the plate for the meats come out.

 

When we sat down, there were 3 to 4 servers carrying meats around. When we went green, there was one. He made good time but he definitely could have used help. The saving grace was some of the larger tables were finishing up and onto dessert.

 

 

 

 

This was the hard working server who did an excellent job by himself.

 

 

The gentleman in the white is our server, but the table he is next too was so demanding with the 6 adults and 4 kids, we got ignored.

 

 

The sides

 

We got to the point where we both had no water and my special drink hadn't been refilled either. We also couldn't get anybody to come refill them either.

 

 

Finally, we had to get up and go talk to the Matre'd to get our water filled. Our server came to our table a grand total of 4 times the entire meal.

 

 

Dessert menu

 

 

Tres Leches Cake

 

 

Coconut Flan

 

The interesting thing that occurred was as soon as we got out desserts, there were 3 people doing the meats again. This was not our most memorable Moderno experience.

 

 

[shadowmeboy]

We walked back to midship on deck 12.

 

 

The Cunard Ship was still pacing us.

 

 

 

Still amongst the Queen Charlotte Islands

 

We headed down to the Art Gallery to close out our Auction purchases from that day. We bought two. A painting by Matt Beyrer.

 

 

As well as this one, an Ashton Howard titled "Bayou Nights"

[shadowmeboy]

Day 3 - Juneau, Alaska

July 2nd, 2023

 

 

Daily

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shadowmeboy]

 

Looking down on deck 5 from deck 11 - left elevators are on 6 & 7

 

 

Nice and calm morning!

 

 

Can you guess where I ended up? If you said Great Outdoors, you would be correct!

 

 

So we are just entering Alaskan territorial waters at this point. It is approximately 5:30 in the morning!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I love being back in Alaska!

 

Just a quick note: the sunrise time-lapse from this morning hits my YouTube channel at 6pm PDT tomorrow (10/7/2023).

[shadowmeboy]

 

pano

 

 

another pano

 

 

Whales!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tail

 

[shadowmeboy]

Susan finally made her way out on deck and it was finally time to head to breakfast!

 

 

Off to Seven Seas we go!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good News! My bowl of cottage cheese was bigger this morning! 

 

 

Although, I think the yogurt parfait got smaller

 

 

Ham and Cheese Omelet

 

 

I got eggs to order and made a bagel breakfast sandwich.

 

If you want to make you own sandwich order:

eggs to order - over medium with either a side of bacon or ham

then order a whole bagel 

and ask for a few cheese slices

 

The eggs to order is normally two eggs, only put one on the sandwich, then assemble the rest of the ingredients and enjoy!

[shadowmeboy]

 

Havana Club/Windjammer Bar - Deck 6 Mid to Aft

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oh look! Another whale!

 

 

 

If you look closely, you can see the water from the whale spout.

 

 

Another one!

 

 

 

 

 

Tail

 

 

 

[shadowmeboy]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pilot Boat

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[shadowmeboy]

 

 

 

 

 

 

Look another spout!

 

 

and another whale!

 

 

Spout

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I could tell we were getting closer to Juneau as the number of boats picked up!

 

 

 

 

Edited October 6, 2023 by shadowmeboy

[shadowmeboy]

We prepared to head down to Battle of the Cake Masters in the Bliss Lounge. 

 

As we left the Stateroom, we found this letter on the door.

 

 

Oh well, it was just a cheap excursion to do in Juneau to use the ShoreEx credit. We had done it before and its not like this was our one and only Alaska cruise and this was a must do activity.

 

 

We got seats for Battle of the Cake Masters

 

 

Like normal, the booze was flowing into the cake!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mudslides as we watch!

 

 

Sampling the example sheet cake

 

Then it was off to lunch!

 

 

Day 3 lunch Menu

 

 

 

 

 

Nicoise Salad

 

 

Shrimp Fritters

 

 

Caprese Salad

 

 

Chicken Parmesean

 

 

BLT Sandwich

 

 

Raspberry Panna Cotta

 

 

Peanut Butter Cup Cheesecake

[shadowmeboy]

After lunch, we headed back to the stateroom to prepare to disembark the vessel! We then headed out to the Great Outdoors till we could head own to the gangway.

 

 

Sailing into Juneau

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I spy a NCL tender boat.

 

 

I spy the Norwegian Spirit! I now have seen the last two ships I have sailed in the last two days!

[shadowmeboy]

 

 

Hello Juneau!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We were pulling into South Franklin Dock

 

 

 

 

 

 

There the dock is

 

[shadowmeboy]

 

 

 

 

 

Susan decided to get an ice cream while waiting.

 

 

 

So in the freestyle daily it says not to feed the Seagulls, obviously the ravens are not following that messaging as they are worse than the Seagulls in Juneau.

 

 

 

Its finally time to head down to disembark. We get down to deck 5 and there is a line. While in line, I am able to get pictures of tonight's MDR menu. We are eating in town, so we will not be on the ship for this dinner.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Off to Juneau we go!

 

----

 

Please note: While I will make every effort to work on this over the weekend, I have to can salsa. I for sure will pick it up on Monday if not before.

[drumming cruisers]

On 10/6/2023 at 3:34 PM, shadowmeboy said:

Susan finally made her way out on deck and it was finally time to head to breakfast!

 

 

Off to Seven Seas we go!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good News! My bowl of cottage cheese was bigger this morning! 

 

 

Although, I think the yogurt parfait got smaller

 

 

Ham and Cheese Omelet

 

 

I got eggs to order and made a bagel breakfast sandwich.

 

If you want to make you own sandwich order:

eggs to order - over medium with either a side of bacon or ham

then order a whole bagel 

and ask for a few cheese slices

 

The eggs to order is normally two eggs, only put one on the sandwich, then assemble the rest of the ingredients and enjoy!

No hashbrowns. Don't they serve them anymore?

[shadowmeboy]

7 minutes ago, drumming cruisers said:

No hashbrowns. Don't they serve them anymore?

Good catch! Yeah, no hashbrowns anywhere. MDR, Buffet, all potatoes with onions. They at least tasted good, but I always asked for mustard.

 

i did prefer those deep fried taters!

Edited October 8, 2023 by shadowmeboy