July 26, 2011 – 7 Night Alaska ~ Bears, Whales, Eagles and Ducks. Oh My!

[lbgraves]

Photos of the Alaska special Merch would be great to see, and lots of pics of the kids with anyone!

Aunt PJ

PJ, this is where DCL screwed up big time. All the pictures of the pins & characters had us planning what to buy. They were sold out of all the port pins and the regular Alaska ones were already discounted 50% or more. They only had a few Plutos in Alaska gear. The zippered hoodies were $55!!!! I know that they weren't nearly that much on the PC cruise...and there were only two of those in 2008 so could have been a hotter commodity, and the Tshirts for the actual crossing day were half the price of the ones for Alaska. It's not like they wouldn't be able to sell the stuffed characters next year on the Alaska cruises. I found tie tack pins in the ports for the kids' lanyards for $2-$3 each. I had planned to spend more on the ship, but bought more in the ports instead.

 

[MrsMork]

We are home. Had fun. Hope to see you all again sometime.

 

[85SLE]

What a great cruise. Every day was terriffic!

 

[ariel39]

We thought that the Pan Pacific was incredible!!! They were all so nice there. I asked about where to take the bags when we got off the ship when they picked them up from our room Tuesday morning and the guy told me to just give them to the person at the door of the hotel to hold for us and tell them we were returning guests. I made sure he knew that we weren't staying there that night and he smiled and said that we had been there before and were family. We ended up walking around Gastown a bit and renting bikes through Stanley Park for a couple hours before watching the Wonder head back out for the next cruise.

Tim was our bellhop when we arrived and he told us to call him in the morning and he would make sure they got to the ship. When we returned, we went back up to him as we needed someone to hold our luggage for about 2 hrs and of course he did. Now there were some other luggage tied up next to ours on the floor, I wonder if that was yours? We were literally the last people off the boat. We were teasing that they were going to close the doors on us....Anyhow he held our luggage so I could go buy another piece and wait for our limo ride.

 

[ariel39]

I thought that the weather from the time we landed in Vancouver on 7/23 until we left this morning was BEAUTIFUL!!! I don't know how Mickey arranged it for us but each and every port was raining for days before we arrived. Everyone I talked to in port said that the sky had cleared up that morning. On the White Pass train there was very little visibility the day before we were in port. Considering the forcast was 60% chance of rain every day when we left for Vancouver, I think that we were all VERY lucky this past week. Not sure who called in all theirs favors to arrange it -- but THANK YOU!!!

See we were freezing the whole time, I wasn't happy with the weather. Tracy Arm was so wet and cold we all went to our rooms. Each of the ports we had to where heavy sweaters....>Were we on the same cruise????

 

[kwm]

Had a great time! It was great meeting everyone. Thank you for the FE gifts. The kids had a fun time and want to do it again!

 

[85SLE]

See we were freezing the whole time, I wasn't happy with the weather. Tracy Arm was so wet and cold we all went to our rooms. Each of the ports we had to where heavy sweaters....>Were we on the same cruise????

I thought the weather was fantastic. Overcast in Scagway but bright and sunny the rest of the time. There was a little rain on Wednesday morning early.

One of the best marine life views of the cruise is when we went through the pod of about 50 to 75 Porpoises on Monday morning around 07:30. I was on a recumbent bike up in the work out area and had a great view.

 

[MrsMork]

See we were freezing the whole time, I wasn't happy with the weather. Tracy Arm was so wet and cold we all went to our rooms. Each of the ports we had to where heavy sweaters....>Were we on the same cruise????

I agree that Tracy Arm was overcast, windy and cold. Mostly though the weather was tolerable, especially for us who had that exact weather thru late June this year. I thought we had been somehow transported home and gone back in time a month!! We also had to wear our sweatshirts in Skagway and Juneau. Ketchikan and the last sea day was perfect weather for us though. However, I found everywhere inside the ship way to hot! We had our temp in the room turned all the way down and it was still very hot. Maybe because it was cold out they turned off the air conditioning????

Had a great time! It was great meeting everyone. Thank you for the FE gifts. The kids had a fun time and want to do it again!

Same for us. Aaron loved finding so many treasures in our FE!

 

[lbgraves]

See we were freezing the whole time, I wasn't happy with the weather. Tracy Arm was so wet and cold we all went to our rooms. Each of the ports we had to where heavy sweaters....>Were we on the same cruise????

I had expected the temps to be cooler in Vancouver and Alaska, along with a lot of rain since the forecast was very gloomy with rain every day, so clear skies made me happy. We arrived in Vancouver on Saturday with sunny skies. Sunday we spent the day on Grouse Mountain with temps in the low 80s and clear skies. The workers there said that it was the best day they had so far this year with visibility. The views were breathtaking! Monday was a bit cloudier but we went to Stanley Park and walked back to the Pan.

The day we were at Dawes Glacier did get rainy. I forgot about that because we were with friends in their side by side verandahs after lunch. I was out on deck 4 with DH wrapped in a blanket whale watching that morning. In Skagway I wore 2 long shirts, a hooded carnigan and 2 sweatshirts when we went into town, and it was cold on the train when we were outside on the platform. The temp was 32 at the top on our ride. I looked at that day as a possitive because it was not raining. Also, one of the guides on the train told us that the day before the clouds were very low to the ground the day before and they couldn't see anything above 100 feet. The views we had were amazing!

In Juneau I only wore 3 layers but by the time we hiked to the base of Nugget Falls and close to Mendenhall Glacier we were all down to just a shirt. I was surprised that it was so warm that close to the glacier. We also just did a lot of walking in Ketchikan and I got warm with 2 layers.

I joked with a couple of the security people as we were getting off the ship in Juneau asking if they purposely post rainy weather forcasts to keep people away. They told me that they thought Mickey brought the nice weather with us because it had been raining for days and cleared up the morning we arrived. We never had to take out our umbrellas. I miss the cooler temps already since we hit 110 yesterday. DH liked this cruise more than the PC repo as far as the scenery.

One of the best marine life views of the cruise is when we went through the pod of about 50 to 75 Porpoises on Monday morning around 07:30. I was on a recumbent bike up in the work out area and had a great view.

Very cool!!! There were a lot of them out later that morning as well. We watched one swimming just under the water next to the portside of the ship for a while.

I However, I found everywhere inside the ship way to hot! We had our temp in the room turned all the way down and it was still very hot. Maybe because it was cold out they turned off the air conditioning????

The AC was on in our room! I tried to adjust it to warm up the room a bit the second day.

 

[lbgraves]

Tim was our bellhop when we arrived and he told us to call him in the morning and he would make sure they got to the ship. When we returned, we went back up to him as we needed someone to hold our luggage for about 2 hrs and of course he did. Now there were some other luggage tied up next to ours on the floor, I wonder if that was yours? We were literally the last people off the boat. We were teasing that they were going to close the doors on us....Anyhow he held our luggage so I could go buy another piece and wait for our limo ride.

We had 7 pieces of luggage with bright blue braids on them. They were there at the Pan until 5:30 Tuesday. We had Minnie tags and were sitting in the Promanade Lounge with our friends. After Ariel was announced the video screens there went blank and we didn't hear any of the announcements. DH checked and found out that they had called Daisy. Someone else checked a little bit later and was told Minnie would be called in 5 minutes. I felt sorry for the CM assigned to that area because they were not getting any information on their radio either. They didn't know that Daisy had been called. We spent the morning riding bikes through Stanley Park, then picked up a few sweatshirts we had spotted before the cruise. Watching the Wonder leaving again was not fun.

 

[plutojudy]

Hi everyone, thanks for all the fun FE gifts. We really enjoyed our cruise and the new friendships.

 

[brackjr]

Back home and we had a great time! Booked a Dream and a Fantasy cruise!

I thought the weather was great! YesTracey Arm was cold but it was supposed to be that way! I have some great photos to post of us on deck. The rest of the cruise was wonderful weather.

 

[lbgraves]

You guys do know that we didn't go to Tracy Arm, right?

I can't wait to see your pictures Brack...and Dennis' pics too!

 

[85SLE]

Cannot post pics until I have 10 posts.

This is #9

 

[85SLE]

Post 10. Sorry for the thread clutter.

 

[85SLE]

I was going to post this two post back.

The good ship Wonder in Scagway.

From the tram in Juneau

 

[Jhalkias]

You guys do know that we didn't go to Tracy Arm, right?

I can't wait to see your pictures Brack...and Dennis' pics too!

Yup. Endicott Arm and the Dawes Glacier is what we saw.

 

[3princessMommy]

Finally back in VA. Had a great cruise! Thanks for the fun Fish Extender gifts! The girls always love finding the surprises!

We thought we had FANTASTIC weather overall. Yes a bit cold and misty at the glacier, but it could have been much worse and the days in Juneau, Ketchikan and at sea were lovely, as was the debarkation day in Vancouver. Absolutely no weather complaints from us at all.

We got some great photos too that I'll post when DH gets them all downloaded.

Hope you all enjoyed it as much as we did!

 

[waltsgirl]

See we were freezing the whole time, I wasn't happy with the weather. Tracy Arm was so wet and cold we all went to our rooms. Each of the ports we had to where heavy sweaters....>Were we on the same cruise????

We thought the weather was great. Sure we had to wear jackets but we were in Alaska. The day at the glacier was chilly but certainly not freezing like Ohio winters or anything. We thought it was a nice break from the 90-100 degree weather we are having in Ohio.

 

[85SLE]

We thought the weather was great. Sure we had to wear jackets but we were in Alaska. The day at the glacier was chilly but certainly not freezing like Ohio winters or anything. We thought it was a nice break from the 90-100 degree weather we are having in Ohio.

X2

The week before we had two 103 degree days in Maryland. Nice to be in cooler temps for the week.