Alaska on July 19th, 2011 "Where a good tan is hard to find"

[Schachteles]

I'm glad it's going to work for you. With our short times is port especially Ketchikan, I was afraid to book on our own so I'm glad we were able to get what we wanted. I think this trip is going to be one of the most amazing trips we've ever been on! Hopefully memorable too, (positively of course) since it's our 20th Wedding Anniversary.

OK back to reality. Gotta go do my errands.

Yeah I never book on my own because I have anxiety about being left at the port...but in booking this one, we are on the same boat as the Disney people, so if there is a delay, the boat will be being held because of those people, so that is the only reason I booked it.

Have fun with your errands.

 

["Got Disney"]

HAPPY FRIDAY EVERYONE!!

I just went on and booked the Bering Sea Fisherman's Tour in Ketchikan

Can't wait for Tuesday...hope we get the other things we want

Me to I booked it yesterday Meg is so nice and funny...the woman that you book with. This is the only one i will be booking on my own this cruise.

Here is our itinerary for our trip: So glad it stays Dark in Canada till like 9:30pm and all day in Alaska

July 13th .....fly into Vancouver and walk around the city.
July 14th .....take bus up to Whistler and do a jeep tour
July 15th.....White water rafting and Canoeing
July 16th.......Take the Gondola and hike and dinner on top of mountain than bike down
July17th...back to Vancouver and tour around by ourselves
July 18th....head up to Suspension bridge than head over to Grouse Mountain for Lumber Jack show and wild animal reserve and all it has to offer and dinner.

July 19th Board ship
Skagway....White Rail Pass and Trail Camp
Juneau.....Helicopter Glacier walk about
Katchikan....Sea Bering fishermen's Tour


CANT WAIT!

 

[Schachteles]

[QUOTE="Got Disney";40742255]Me to I booked it yesterday Meg is so nice and funny...the woman that you book with. This is the only one i will be booking on my own this cruise.

Here is our itinerary for our trip: So glad it stays Dark in Canada till like 9:30pm and all day in Alaska

July 13th .....fly into Vancouver and walk around the city.
July 14th .....take bus up to Whistler and do a jeep tour
July 15th.....White water rafting and Canoeing
July 16th.......Take the Gondola and hike and dinner on top of mountain than bike down
July17th...back to Vancouver and tour around by ourselves
July 18th....head up to Suspension bridge than head over to Grouse Mountain for Lumber Jack show and wild animal reserve and all it has to offer and dinner.

July 19th Board ship
Skagway....White Rail Pass and Trail Camp
Juneau.....Helicopter Glacier walk about
Katchikan....Sea Bering fishermen's Tour


CANT WAIT![/QUOTE]

WOW you are planned out. We leave Minnesota on the 17th and fly into Seattle and will spend a day and a half there and then head up to Vancouver...go on the cruise...and then spend another 3 days in Vancouver after. We need to get planning. We are thinking about doing a whale watching cruise, but I am thinking about holding back on booking that till we see if we see any when we are out on our other excursions, because if I can save that $500 then I am going to.

Did you get your other excursions booked already?

 

["Got Disney"]

WOW you are planned out. We leave Minnesota on the 17th and fly into Seattle and will spend a day and a half there and then head up to Vancouver...go on the cruise...and then spend another 3 days in Vancouver after. We need to get planning. We are thinking about doing a whale watching cruise, but I am thinking about holding back on booking that till we see if we see any when we are out on our other excursions, because if I can save that $500 then I am going to.

Did you get your other excursions booked already?

that was how we looked at it...trying to do something that would give us more than one thing on each excursion...for example

We were going to take the train up to Whistler...but instead will take the White Rail pass and than DH can still get to go to Lairsville to pan for his Gold..

*The next one we wanted to do sight seeing in the air but also didnt want to miss seeing the Mendenhall Glacier...so this way we get a 15 minute helicopter tour there and do an hr trek in trekking clothing they provide for us with a tour on the glacier than another 15 minute flight tour on the way back....

Than we wanted to see eagles and whales but also the Sea Bering tour...so with the Sea Bering tour we get to do that and see Orcas that are there all year around(dont need Humpback because have seen them here in San Diego) and the Eagles are all around the boat because they love the fishing boats and they throw fish in the water for the eagles to dive after. Plus other marine life...

And we also wanted to do the Lumber Jack show so that we can see in Vancouver at Grouse Mountain along with the wolves and Bear habitats. And Totem Poles also.

so tryed to make the money count and get in as much as possible that had multiple adventures per excursion.....If we were going to spend a lot than we needed to get a lot from each one.

 

[mouseclick1]

For those of you that are spending a little extra time in Vancouver, The Vancouver Entertainment Book is on sale for $15. If you buy a second one, it is only $10. I just bought two books since there are four of us going. There is a buy one get one free coupon for the Sun Yat-Sen Chinese Garden, which I was planning on going to anyway. Tickets are $12, so for the four of us that saves me $24!

Here's a link if anyone's interested:

http://entertainment.com/discount/change_location.shtml

 

["Got Disney"]

For those of you that are spending a little extra time in Vancouver, The Vancouver Entertainment Book is on sale for $15. If you buy a second one, it is only $10. I just bought two books since there are four of us going. There is a buy one get one free coupon for the Sun Yat-Sen Chinese Garden, which I was planning on going to anyway. Tickets are $12, so for the four of us that saves me $24!

Here's a link if anyone's interested:

http://entertainment.com/discount/change_location.shtml

I cant find the book for Vancouver on the link???? I see the one for Vancouver WA...but not Vancouver Canada(BC)...Oh wait I found it...thanks

 

[MrsG]

Thanks so much for the entertainment book info. We get one for our hometown each year, but never gave it a thought. We ordered one for Vancouver and Victoria as we are staying a few days in each place. And you are right, just the garden in Vancouver and the castle in Victoria are almost the cost of the books. A few more meals, etc. and it will more than pay for itself.

 

[Meskamooska]

Hi All,

I hope everyone has been having an enjoyable and relaxing weekend. My whole family is finally over their ills (bronchitis all around - fun huh?), the sun is shining, the birds are singing, the cat hasn't broken anything too expensive and all's right with the world.

I spent the better part of last evening and night (until the wee hours of this morning actually) and about another hour this AM looking over the handmade FE's thread trying to get additional ideas, enjoying everyones artistry, creativity, thoughtfullness and I confess lurking to see if anyone from my thread posted what they were making or doing

All of that FE excitement got me to thinking about our FE group and sent me to examine my FE stash. I have discovered, somewhat to my surprise, that I have waaaaaaay overproduced one item but am sorely lacking in other areas. Fortunately, I think I still have plenty of time to rebalance the scales but I am racking my brain trying to come up with what to do and how to do it. We seem to have an interesting balance of ages and genders in our group, I think we have just about every age and stage, excluding infants accounted for. On the downside, one side probably won't fit most... on the upside diversity is a really good thing.

I did get a bit of distressing news the Cruise park company that I had booked a reservation with for long term parking sent me a letter via email saying that they would not be providing parking for the 2011 cruise season and that our parking rate would be honored by Vinci parking at Canada Place. They said that they would be refunding our money but I haven't seen hide nor hair of the refund as yet so I am not sure what to believe. Did anyone else get an email like this? I am always leery of scams and when something comes in by way of my spam or bulk mail folder I tend to be a bit suspicious.

Ahh well, I need to go back to learning how to use Final Cut Express and Photoshop CS5 so that I can actually edit the photos and video I have shot in the past and get ready for all the photos and video that are looming in my rather near future

Take care all, help lots of people and have a "Wonder"ful day!

Tisza

 

[twinmom108]

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. Ours was very busy. Our twin sons went to their Senior Prom w/ dates & both said it was the most fabulous night of their lives. Oh to be young again.

 

[Schachteles]

Hi All,

I hope everyone has been having an enjoyable and relaxing weekend. My whole family is finally over their ills (bronchitis all around - fun huh?), the sun is shining, the birds are singing, the cat hasn't broken anything too expensive and all's right with the world.

I spent the better part of last evening and night (until the wee hours of this morning actually) and about another hour this AM looking over the handmade FE's thread trying to get additional ideas, enjoying everyones artistry, creativity, thoughtfullness and I confess lurking to see if anyone from my thread posted what they were making or doing

All of that FE excitement got me to thinking about our FE group and sent me to examine my FE stash. I have discovered, somewhat to my surprise, that I have waaaaaaay overproduced one item but am sorely lacking in other areas. Fortunately, I think I still have plenty of time to rebalance the scales but I am racking my brain trying to come up with what to do and how to do it. We seem to have an interesting balance of ages and genders in our group, I think we have just about every age and stage, excluding infants accounted for. On the downside, one side probably won't fit most... on the upside diversity is a really good thing.

I did get a bit of distressing news the Cruise park company that I had booked a reservation with for long term parking sent me a letter via email saying that they would not be providing parking for the 2011 cruise season and that our parking rate would be honored by Vinci parking at Canada Place. They said that they would be refunding our money but I haven't seen hide nor hair of the refund as yet so I am not sure what to believe. Did anyone else get an email like this? I am always leery of scams and when something comes in by way of my spam or bulk mail folder I tend to be a bit suspicious.

Ahh well, I need to go back to learning how to use Final Cut Express and Photoshop CS5 so that I can actually edit the photos and video I have shot in the past and get ready for all the photos and video that are looming in my rather near future

Take care all, help lots of people and have a "Wonder"ful day!

Tisza

I am so proud of you for being on top of the FE exchanges. I really need to get working on mine. I have no idea what I am going to do. Just not enough hours in the day. And we are gone in 90 days, so wow, I need to get my butt in gear. I wonder if we can ship our things to the ship like you do in Port Canaveral?

 

[Meskamooska]

I am so proud of you for being on top of the FE exchanges. I really need to get working on mine. I have no idea what I am going to do. Just not enough hours in the day. And we are gone in 90 days, so wow, I need to get my butt in gear. I wonder if we can ship our things to the ship like you do in Port Canaveral?

Hi!

I agree that there really aren't enough hours in a day. Of course if I could just do without that pesky need to eat and sleep I could double my available time .

As for the FE's, don't be too proud, I have the girls pretty well in hand but am a bit "at sea" as to what to do for guys and all of our teens and tweens. I have some ideas but as of yet I haven't had anything in those arenas that has just sent me, you know what I mean?

I haven't seen anything about shipping to the port but that might be a good question to ask my TA or DCL. One of them might know. Since we are going to be driving up I haven't been too concerned with space in our luggage but I have been trying to be mindful of lack of space in the luggage of others when considering what to give. Thus, I ruled out the genuine Adobe brick paperweights, build your own full sized Hollywood sign kits and replicas of the Disneyland Castle (actual size).

And I pretty much lost the better part of today because I did something so stupid I can't believe I did it, or rather, I can't believe I didn't do it sooner...

I went to a training class at the Apple store (I am gearing up for all the photos and video I plan on taking in Alaska and on the ship) and while I was there I mentioned that I seemed to have a large amount of space on my hard drive taken up but I didn't know with what. The trainer I was working with pushed a few keys and found a file with 72 gigs of stuff in it. I was shocked (and truly not using my head) and when he suggested that I could reclaim that space by deleting the file and emptying the trash I didn't give it a second thought and pushed the appropriate keys.

Well, I got my hard drive space back all right because what I had done was delete EVERY PICTURE AND VIDEO FILE ON MY COMPUTER! Whoops! I didn't realize exactly what I had done until last night when I opened up my photo program and it was clean as a whistle.

I wound up spending a good portion of today trying to recover as much as I could and then having to open every single stinking little file (because the recovery program doesn't save what you called the file or what it was grouped with or anything else but the meat of the matter) to figure out what it was and where it belonged.

On the upside, I don't think I really lost any photos (I had them backed up on a portable hard drive as well as another computer), at least none that I remember with one exception - I had done a really nice retouch job on a picture of my oldest son and his bride and that is gone baby gone. I can do the retouch again but what a pain.

On the downside I didn't find the video footage that was shot at my great nephew's second birthday party and I think I was the only one there with a video camera .

I suppose I should count my blessings since I was able to recover the footage from my DBF's son's 13th birthday so I guess all is not completely lost but boy do I feel like a dolt.

Let this be a warning to all - BACK UP EVERYTHING... FREQUENTLY. Oh, and when someone tells you to do something, stop... take a breath... THINK BEFORE YOU ACT or I might have to send you the info for the $100 program I had to buy to try to recover 15 minutes of history.

On another note, I can hardly wait for tomorrow evening since I think that is when we here on the west coast can start booking our excursions and our ressies for Palo. I shall be keeping my fingers crossed for a lunch and a brunch.

Take care all, help lots of people and have a "Wonder"ful day!

Tisza

 

[Schachteles]

Hi!

I agree that there really aren't enough hours in a day. Of course if I could just do without that pesky need to eat and sleep I could double my available time .

As for the FE's, don't be too proud, I have the girls pretty well in hand but am a bit "at sea" as to what to do for guys and all of our teens and tweens. I have some ideas but as of yet I haven't had anything in those arenas that has just sent me, you know what I mean?

I haven't seen anything about shipping to the port but that might be a good question to ask my TA or DCL. One of them might know. Since we are going to be driving up I haven't been too concerned with space in our luggage but I have been trying to be mindful of lack of space in the luggage of others when considering what to give. Thus, I ruled out the genuine Adobe brick paperweights, build your own full sized Hollywood sign kits and replicas of the Disneyland Castle (actual size).

And I pretty much lost the better part of today because I did something so stupid I can't believe I did it, or rather, I can't believe I didn't do it sooner...

I went to a training class at the Apple store (I am gearing up for all the photos and video I plan on taking in Alaska and on the ship) and while I was there I mentioned that I seemed to have a large amount of space on my hard drive taken up but I didn't know with what. The trainer I was working with pushed a few keys and found a file with 72 gigs of stuff in it. I was shocked (and truly not using my head) and when he suggested that I could reclaim that space by deleting the file and emptying the trash I didn't give it a second thought and pushed the appropriate keys.

Well, I got my hard drive space back all right because what I had done was delete EVERY PICTURE AND VIDEO FILE ON MY COMPUTER! Whoops! I didn't realize exactly what I had done until last night when I opened up my photo program and it was clean as a whistle.

I wound up spending a good portion of today trying to recover as much as I could and then having to open every single stinking little file (because the recovery program doesn't save what you called the file or what it was grouped with or anything else but the meat of the matter) to figure out what it was and where it belonged.

On the upside, I don't think I really lost any photos (I had them backed up on a portable hard drive as well as another computer), at least none that I remember with one exception - I had done a really nice retouch job on a picture of my oldest son and his bride and that is gone baby gone. I can do the retouch again but what a pain.

On the downside I didn't find the video footage that was shot at my great nephew's second birthday party and I think I was the only one there with a video camera .

I suppose I should count my blessings since I was able to recover the footage from my DBF's son's 13th birthday so I guess all is not completely lost but boy do I feel like a dolt.

Let this be a warning to all - BACK UP EVERYTHING... FREQUENTLY. Oh, and when someone tells you to do something, stop... take a breath... THINK BEFORE YOU ACT or I might have to send you the info for the $100 program I had to buy to try to recover 15 minutes of history.

On another note, I can hardly wait for tomorrow evening since I think that is when we here on the west coast can start booking our excursions and our ressies for Palo. I shall be keeping my fingers crossed for a lunch and a brunch.

Take care all, help lots of people and have a "Wonder"ful day!

Tisza

I need to get planning. Have to start looking through who is participating and get working on it. I too will be better set for the little ones. We are flying to Seattle and then driving to Vancouver, so I really don't want to have food going over the boarder with me and I would't want things to melt in the car, which makes it kinda tough.

That is SO scary about your photos, we had our extrenal hard drive do kaput and I thought we lost all our baby pictures and such, I was CRUSHED, thankfully for some reason (now I know the reason) we didn't delete them off of our computer. Glad you were able to recover them!!

FE participants, when do we want to cut off signing up for the FE exchange??

 

["Got Disney"]

I need to get planning. Have to start looking through who is participating and get working on it. I too will be better set for the little ones. We are flying to Seattle and then driving to Vancouver, so I really don't want to have food going over the boarder with me and I would't want things to melt in the car, which makes it kinda tough.

That is SO scary about your photos, we had our extrenal hard drive do kaput and I thought we lost all our baby pictures and such, I was CRUSHED, thankfully for some reason (now I know the reason) we didn't delete them off of our computer. Glad you were able to recover them!!

FE participants, when do we want to cut off signing up for the FE exchange??

Glad the pictures were recovered....wow that would have been a bummer...I have had to get mine recovered after a couple crashes. so I feel your pain!

I have nor problem having it go up to a couple weeks(even a week before) prior the cruise if someone else comes in and wants to join. I may not be able to get them the same things that I would get everyone else(have not decided yet what that will be) but I can get them something...adding another family or 2 or 3 is no big deal. I think who has decided out of all of us has already decided. It would be the new folks if we get anyone else that would be added. We are still 3 months out so can see others hunting down this thread and joining on still.

dont forget tonight those in the west can add on excursions from 9pm on....back east at midnight on.....it starts at midnight back east time so figure out your time zone in order to get on.

I could have booked earlier but waited till today because wanted to be sure they are what we for sure wanted to do and had to see how our taxs turned out if we needed to take any money from our vacation account to pay more in taxs...but we are fine so will get on today and book what we figured we would.

Boys passports are on there way and DH and I go this Friday afternoon. I will be converting my FE over to the Wonder from the Magic and also changing out some magnets.

Also read on another thread that some at DCL are saying we wont have a pirate night and others saying we will....seems DCL cant get their stories straight. I know no fireworks but they are saying that they will be doing an alternative to pirate night in the atrium....grrrrrrrrrrrr I love pirate night...not the food that night but the music and the dancing.

 

[Schachteles]

[QUOTE="Got Disney";40790856]Glad the pictures were recovered....wow that would have been a bummer...I have had to get mine recovered after a couple crashes. so I feel your pain!

I have nor problem having it go up to a couple weeks(even a week before) prior the cruise if someone else comes in and wants to join. I may not be able to get them the same things that I would get everyone else(have not decided yet what that will be) but I can get them something...adding another family or 2 or 3 is no big deal. I think who has decided out of all of us has already decided. It would be the new folks if we get anyone else that would be added. We are still 3 months out so can see others hunting down this thread and joining on still.

dont forget tonight those in the west can add on excursions from 9pm on....back east at midnight on.....it starts at midnight back east time so figure out your time zone in order to get on.

I could have booked earlier but waited till today because wanted to be sure they are what we for sure wanted to do and had to see how our taxs turned out if we needed to take any money from our vacation account to pay more in taxs...but we are fine so will get on today and book what we figured we would.

Boys passports are on there way and DH and I go this Friday afternoon. I will be converting my FE over to the Wonder from the Magic and also changing out some magnets.

Also read on another thread that some at DCL are saying we wont have a pirate night and others saying we will....seems DCL cant get their stories straight. I know no fireworks but they are saying that they will be doing an alternative to pirate night in the atrium....grrrrrrrrrrrr I love pirate night...not the food that night but the music and the dancing.[/QUOTE]

I am good with waiting longer to allow people to join in. It is such a good time, I wouldn't want someone to not participate.

All I can think about is at 11pm CST tonight I do my excursions, I am having an anxiety attack about it, I just hope we get what we want!! At least we booked the Bering Sea Crab Fishermans Tour on our own, so that is one less to "stress" about.

I think I am going to print off my list of FE participants and start coming up with ideas while I sit and wait for 11 to come around

 

["Got Disney"]

I am good with waiting longer to allow people to join in. It is such a good time, I wouldn't want someone to not participate.

All I can think about is at 11pm CST tonight I do my excursions, I am having an anxiety attack about it, I just hope we get what we want!! At least we booked the Bering Sea Crab Fishermans Tour on our own, so that is one less to "stress" about.

I think I am going to print off my list of FE participants and start coming up with ideas while I sit and wait for 11 to come around

I would say do the first one that you think will be gone first. Like for me if we still decide to do the train(looking right know to make sure before I go and book today) that will be done after i book the helicopter walk about. We are doing all late excursions not the early ones so that seems to always help. The train will have lots of room so that is why that will be booked after. Still have not decided about Palo yet...but we do brunch and even when we have not booked it online we have gone there when we get on the ship go into Palo and always get a booking. dinner is harder to get. But the cruise may be different this time because it being Alaska.

so besides the bering tour what wlse is your game plan?

 

[Schachteles]

[QUOTE="Got Disney";40791258]I would say do the first one that you think will be gone first. Like for me if we still decide to do the train(looking right know to make sure before I go and book today) that will be done after i book the helicopter walk about. We are doing all late excursions not the early ones so that seems to always help. The train will have lots of room so that is why that will be booked after. Still have not decided about Palo yet...but we do brunch and even when we have not booked it online we have gone there when we get on the ship go into Palo and always get a booking. dinner is harder to get. But the cruise may be different this time because it being Alaska.

so besides the bering tour what wlse is your game plan?[/QUOTE]

We are looking at the Disney Exclusive Dog Musher for the Day, so that will be the first thing I book. My only hope is that the price will scare people away and we will be able to get in. The other is the Liarsville Disney Exclusive Panning for Gold one, if we don't get that I won't be crushed, we can find something else. But I know my daughters would be crushed if we didn't get the musher one.

Make sure you post tonight what you get! I haven't even thought about Palo, guess I better see. We were thinking about doing it on our actual anniversary, but that is the day we going through Tracy Arm, and I am not sure if we want to make plans that day other than camping out on our verandah!

 

[mouseclick1]

Funny coincidence happened in my class today. My students were doing a page out of their book for grammar practice and had to correct the punctuation and capitalization of various sentences. One of the sentences actually had Skagway in it, and my booking window opens tonight at midnight. I was going to wait until tomorrow morning to book but now I think it that might have been a sign since Skagway is the only city where I'm booking a Disney excursion! Guess who'll be staying up to midnight tonight!

I'm hoping for the 4 X 4 trail ride in Skagway and a Palo brunch. I'll be fine if I can't get a brunch, but I'm really keeping my fingers crossed for the excursion!

Good luck to my fellow Silver cruisers - hope you all get what you want tonight!

 

[twinmom108]

Here's some pixiedust for all you "silver" CC members. Hope you get all the shore excursion, spa, & Palo ressies you want!

 

[mootmoot]

Hi all! Sorry to go MIA... It's down to the wire for us Silver folks, so I guess I'd better have some sort of plan finalized for excursions within the next few hours, huh? Dang, I was hoping it would all sort itself out if I ignored it long enough!

OK, only the kids in our group will participate in the FE exchange, if that is OK

As for the FE exchange, sorry for any confusion on my part about "kids only". We have multiple families vacationing in our party, and I didn't know if we were expected to exchange 1:1. Anyhow, what I meant was: our cabins are participating, we'll have our FE pockets out, we're not sure what gifts we'll bring yet but it will probably be something for each cabin to share, and lastly, I know our kids will have so much fun with whatever they discover in their FE pockets! We don't expect a gift for each and every member of our party, is what I meant.

 

["Got Disney"]

Hi all! Sorry to go MIA... It's down to the wire for us Silver folks, so I guess I'd better have some sort of plan finalized for excursions within the next few hours, huh? Dang, I was hoping it would all sort itself out if I ignored it long enough!



As for the FE exchange, sorry for any confusion on my part about "kids only". We have multiple families vacationing in our party, and I didn't know if we were expected to exchange 1:1. Anyhow, what I meant was: our cabins are participating, we'll have our FE pockets out, we're not sure what gifts we'll bring yet but it will probably be something for each cabin to share, and lastly, I know our kids will have so much fun with whatever they discover in their FE pockets! We don't expect a gift for each and every member of our party, is what I meant.

I have not decided yet if I will be doing individules or familys....will depend on what I find I best figure it out before it gets to late....still have lots of stuff to do and feel like I am falling behind.

I will be booking Palos for the Brunch on one of the sea days...and that may include Tracy Arm....after all we will have all day to view and freeze. Only will book Tracy Arm if all else is filled up. I find Brunch the easiest to get....may also book the Tea.

Will not be doing any spa treatments this time...we have no money left since the excursion cost more than my house well not really but well...close

We would have loved to take the kids to the dog sledding but that did scare me away So that is why we settled for the Medenhall by helicopter Glacer walk about....its more than just the one where you walk around the glacier..... they bring you on a tour with all the gear on and trekking shoes...

Sure wish i could figure out what the heck I am going to pack for this. All my cruise clothing are for warm cruises...all my dinner wear are for warm cruises....will have to brain storm. Will have to hit the sales come summer to get some good deals on warmer clothing....after all we do live in Ca.