First trip to the final frontier - 8 night Alaska - 9/11/23 - completed

[bcwife76]

Well spotted with the whales!! Patience paid off Oh my goodness, I love how you two take such cute selfies the whole time
We received that laundry "offer" twice on our Europe cruise but honestly with four of us, 30 pieces didn't go far so we ended up doing our own laundry during the cruise. Had it just been two of us I would have been inclined to use that service!

 

[ukintheus]

Well spotted with the whales!! Patience paid off Oh my goodness, I love how you two take such cute selfies the whole time
We received that laundry "offer" twice on our Europe cruise but honestly with four of us, 30 pieces didn't go far so we ended up doing our own laundry during the cruise. Had it just been two of us I would have been inclined to use that service!

Scott is the master of getting good selfies and seeing as gravity isn’t kind to anything below the chin line they work for me!

The laundry deal worked out well as it was early on (and just the two of us) but we had to do more before the end of the week. I can’t imagine trying to keep up with four people’s worth at home, let alone on a vacation!!

I was so excited to see the whales. It’s only the second time I’ve ever seen any (other than Seaworld ), the first time was on our Panama Canal cruise.

 

[cruisehopeful]

I can't wait to hear about Sitka. I've been to the other ports a couple times each and don't really feel the need to go back to any of them, even though I enjoyed Skagway and Juneau. I never quite understood the attraction of Ketchikan, but maybe you found something better there than what I have done. Looking forward to the rest.

 

[disneyfaninaz]

So glad you spotted the whales! Great photos! I can never seem to get focused on them soon enough to get any good pics or I'm way too late after they've been spotted!

I the souffle!

 

[ukintheus]

I can't wait to hear about Sitka. I've been to the other ports a couple times each and don't really feel the need to go back to any of them, even though I enjoyed Skagway and Juneau. I never quite understood the attraction of Ketchikan, but maybe you found something better there than what I have done. Looking forward to the rest.

We didn't find the other ports to have much going for them unless you did an excursion. Seemed to us they are basically an Alaskan version of any port in Mexico. Sitka was way less "touristy" and we enjoyed our day there.

 

[ukintheus]

So glad you spotted the whales! Great photos! I can never seem to get focused on them soon enough to get any good pics or I'm way too late after they've been spotted!

I the souffle!

Scott gets the credit for the photos of the whales, they came out really well compared to mine with my cell phone which weren't good at all.

 

[ukintheus]

Wednesday, September 13th – Glacier Day

Glacier day is finally upon us and I couldn’t stay in bed any longer and was up by about 6:45 am and peeking outside to see how the day was looking.

The forecast was calling for rain all day, but, the forecast had pretty much been for rain every day and so far we had got lucky, so it was just a case of wait and see.

While we were getting ready there was a Brightstar call for Deck 2, those are always a bit sad to hear and you just hope everyone is OK. Dressed and ready to get our day started we were off to get coffee in Cove Café by 8:00 am to get the day rolling. It was fairly busy but after a few minutes someone else came along to help and got a production line going and things sped up.

It was a lot cooler today and there was quite a breeze so we tucked ourselves against the wall and covered up with blankets while we hung out drinking our coffee and people watching.

We decided to head back down to Deck 4 and see what we could see from there. Being closer to the water was better at times, we felt, than being up on the top decks. They were just bringing the pilot on board so we stood and watched that for a bit.

We were beginning to see some ice on the peaks in the distance which was a good appetizer to the day ahead of us.

And then we were treated to some more whales playing off in the distance. To be honest, we couldn’t tell that they were orcas until we zoomed into the photo, but it was another nice surprise to say that we saw them.

We had the Castaway Club reception at 9:30 am in the Walt Disney Theatre so we made our way inside to get over there. More Meet & Greets and the Frozen Maypole was also up in the atrium as we passed by.

The theatre was open already and they were offering mimosas, prosecco or an alcohol free something (no interest! ) so we both took a mimosa and found a couple of seats. Second day in a row with drinks before noon.

It did fill up quite a bit after I took this photo. White coats were there to chat with everyone.

Cruise director, Trent, who we really enjoyed the whole cruise, did all the introductions and the bulk of the talking before the captain came on (I think it was Captain Thord but I’m not remembering 100%, he was Norwegian/Scandinavian (I know that!) and (very shyly) did his part of the presentation.

Then we were treated to some behind the scenes looks at how they move the scenery and also how Olaf is animated. The actor animating Olaf did a presentation on the last day of the cruise about his career, and I would have loved to see it but it conflicted with our Champagne Tasting, and I love champagne more. Of course, no photos during the presentation so right as it began is all I got.

As soon as the presentation was over we grabbed our warmer gear again from the cabin and headed up to Deck 10 to see what we had been missing out on. The Captain had announced that the Coast Guard were going to be coming to do a medical evacuation due to the Bright Star announcement earlier this morning and so we actually passed this glacier up in the mountains twice, once on the way to where they did the exchange with the Coast Guard and then we doubled back again. This is zoomed in but it was all good anticipation.

There were a lot of character meet and greets going on with them in their Alaskan outfits but we aren’t willing to spend time standing in line to get our photos taken so Scott got these while we were walking around Deck 10 instead.

It was right around 10:30 am that we figured out we were hungry so we did a quick check on Cabanas, which was just closing. We settled on chicken strips and fries instead and sat and ate on Deck 9, pretty quickly I might add as it was decidedly chilly today!

We went back down to Deck 4 as it was less windy than Deck 10 and not as crowded. The ship had slowed and come to a stop while the Coast Guard pulled up. The medical evacuation took a while and the captain came on to say that they would be taking the passenger to Juneau and then they would be flown to Anchorage. I hope that they are OK and made a full recovery. I think this was the third medical evacuation we have witnessed from DCL, obviously it’s something that happens more often than you would think. (Technically Mum’s medical emergency wasn’t an evacuation as we took ourselves off the ship – so I didn’t count that one – LOL.) While that all went on the first Glacier Excursion boats were also waiting.

I always feel so sorry for the family because we know how much of a scramble it is, and you are just in a whirlwind it seems.

This was one of the Glacier Explorer boats waiting so that they could begin loading.

It was about midday when the Coast Guard pulled away so it was obvious the first excursion was going to be running a bit late as they were supposed to leave at noon. I had got a message in the Navigator app that we should be down at the WDT by 2 pm for our 3 pm excursion which seemed like it was now going to be REALLY early. Someone standing next to us heard me talking and said hers had been updated to 2:30 pm, and sure enough when I looked so had ours. I was glad she said something!

In the end the first excursion left at 12:30 pm, so it was about half an hour late. I got onto the internet briefly to try and figure out where we were exactly as the captain had said we would be going to Endicott Arm. I don’t know that this helped much at the time but we decided we should go back up to Deck 10.

Quick drive by of Daisy as she was coming/going.

The temperature definitely seemed like it had dropped, but there was also a pretty stiff breeze up on the top deck, we were chilly despite all the layers, which for me were: two pairs of socks, Vessi shoes; thermal leggings, windproof quick dry pants, a short-sleeved t-shirt, a long sleeved t-shirt; fleece jacket and windproof/waterproof jacket; gloves and a beanie. My feet were still cold.

One more character photo on our way past.

This was our second time around on this glacier but we were much closer this time.

It was so cold to stand and get this photo, we basically walked around the front of the ship and then ducked back behind the plexiglass wall along with just about everyone else. There was quite a bit of water on the top deck from earlier rain and we were glad we didn’t have to worry about our feet getting wet as well as cold.

They were serving hot chocolate and coffee as well as soup (I think) and although you could add some adult beverage to your drink neither of us did as that would have required taking our gloves off to get our KTTW card. We did run into Charlie who had been our sever on Panama Canal a long time ago. It took him a while to figure out who we were as he’s used to seeing us as a family – he did remember Mum and Maureen though!

 

[ukintheus]

Quick selfie as we watched the trees go by. Alaksa isn’t short of trees, I can tell you that.

The line for this photographer was short, as in two people in front of us, so we got some photos done. Thankfully our backs were to the wind but we got a couple where we are killing ourselves laughing because the wind was so strong behind us. The beanie was really handy in keeping my hair out of my face.

It was also raining on and off but the hoods on our jackets were perfect to tighten up around our faces to block out wind and sprinkling rain. More pretty stuff to watch.

And then we got our first glimpse of ice in the water which had everyone talking and photographing at the same time.

Scott got some great photos today for sure and one thing I hadn’t considered before today was that using my phone as a camera meant I had to keep taking my gloves off and on, as my phone wouldn’t work despite them supposedly touch friendly (or whatever it’s called). It was a pain really, whereas Scott could use his DSLR and its button without taking his gloves off at all.

It was now about 2:30 pm and so we left and went down to the WDT for the second Glacier Explorer excursion of the day. They were showing the bridge view camera on the screens so you didn’t feel like you were completely missing out on the views while you waited. And waited. And waited. Of course, (no shocker here) the excursion was running late, because the first one didn’t leave on time, so it was almost 50 minutes of waiting. Saoirse, from Ireland, who was doing the trivia in Crown and Fin, made a valiant effort to keep everyone entertained. I believe that she just about told her entire life story while we waited.

Finally, at just before 3:30 pm we walked down and boarded.

Right as we pulled away it started to drizzle, which was pretty much constant the whole trip, other than right towards the end when it was just downright raining, but we decided to tough it out and stay up on the open deck the entire time as we didn’t want to miss a thing.

It was a short journey before we rounded the corner and got our first sight of the glacier. I’m going to be 100% honest here, as it came into view my first thought was, that’s it? It looked smaller than I thought it was going to be against the backdrop of the mountains. Until we got up closer, and that’s when you realize, yeah, it’s pretty big.

It was so cool to see, and we got so many photos, but here’s the best of them. There was another boat there, in addition to the two from the ship when we first arrived, which I assume was a private charter, and it did get even closer than either of the excursion boats.

The Wonder came into view as we were at the glacier.

Inching closer…

Quick note here that the excursion boat had one side facing the glacier for a while, and then rotated so the other side was. We elected to stay on the same side as it was pretty full and if you weren’t right at the rail you couldn’t get as-good photos. We got lucky to see the glacier calve a couple of times while we were on that side. Scott got this one pretty well. We did miss photographing the biggest one though because we were on the other side, but it was a good size and the noise and the wake from it falling were pretty impressive.

There were some good photo ops while not taking glacier pics to take them off the seals that were all hanging out on the ice and very unphased by everything.

The Wonder had reached the point where she was turning toward the glacier and she got pretty close, I’m sure with a good zoom lens there were some great photos to be had from the ship.

We reciprocated with the couple standing next to us in getting some photos that weren’t just head and shoulders.

Like this one…

We were at the glacier quite a while, probably close to an hour, before they turned away and we passed the Wonder going back down the fjord. You can see the glacier is definitely fairly large.

I forgot to mention that there was narration pretty much the entire trip but with us being up on the open deck it was hard to hear. They did have a crew member up there though that was answering questions and also explaining things just not in as much detail.

They had pulled in a chunk of ice and were happy to take photos of everyone holding it. I know they pull in a big chuck on the Wonder but we didn’t see it until the following day.

They pointed out some mountain goats that were making their way down the mountainside. It’s no joke that they look like they are balancing on nothing, it was crazy to watch. They weren’t easy to see even when you knew they were there and especially if they weren’t moving, and without binoculars they would have been even harder to spot, I’m sure.

 

[ukintheus]

We came up on one of the ice chunks and the boat got really close so that we could get some amazing photographs. It was almost as good as the glacier viewing as it was so interesting to see how the ice was formed and all the colors. Again, major props to the hubby for getting some great shots of it.

Speaking of shots, they were selling drinks downstairs and one of them was a cocktail with glacier ice in it, but we were enjoying ourselves upstairs too much to be bothered to go down and check it out.

They really upped the speed at this point and we were heading back to the ship so it was definitely chilly up top but we stuck it out anyway. One other thing that we wish we had with us was a couple of microfiber cloths to wipe the camera lens. Scott had one glass cleaning cloth but it got pretty saturated and, in the end, I was fishing out the bottom of my shirt so that we could use it to get the rain drops off.

It was a about 6 pm when we pulled alongside and we went downstairs to get off. We were glad we had toughed it out upstairs as all the windows were fogged up and it was a pretty steamy mass of humanity down there.

Despite it being just gone 6 pm we made a quick dash back to the cabin to shuck off all the layers and got to our table at 6:15 pm. We had asked our servers the night before if it would be an issue if we were late to dinner and they had assured us it wouldn’t be but we apologized anyway, as I know it has to throw off their service somewhat. Tonight, we were in Animators Palate with the rotational menu.

Scott had the Salmon Tartare and I had the Baked Potato Soup.

We just about inhaled the bread. We’d had those chicken strips to share earlier and hadn’t eaten anything else all day so we were pretty hungry.

We shared the Ginger-Teriyaki dusted Angus Beef Tenderloin and the Lemon-Thyme Marinated All-Natural Chicken Breast. Everything tasted really good tonight.

We even got a half decent mid-way through dinner picture!

We split a couple of desserts, the Lemon Icebox Pie and the Warm Sticky Date Pudding. The sticky date pudding won easily. There’s nothing like a good pudding on a cold day!

Here’s a horrible picture of our servers as they did their parade.

And a horrible picture of Mickey as we both forgot to get our phones ready to take a photograph and so this one was rushed and last minute by me, which is the kiss of death for any photo.

Bellies full and feeling a lot warmer we decided to give French Quarter Lounge another shot this evening and it was a busier as they had live entertainment.

A couple of glasses of red something to keep us warm.

I’m forgetting the name of these two, but they were from the UK and it was good to have something to watch and listen to and they were pretty entertaining.

 

[ukintheus]

When their set was over, we decided to see what was going on elsewhere. They had some backdrops set up in the atrium and there weren’t any lines, so…may as well.

There isn’t much we take too seriously, and especially not ourselves!

Our meandering didn’t take us far and we landed in Cadillac Lounge, which was fairly busy.

They had a happy hour going on which gave you 30% off any of the drinks on the menu so we both tried the Rob Roy. It was a one and done as it was on the sweeter side, but the 30% off was a nice kick to the normal $21 price tag.

We were both ready to call it a night by now as we'd been up and about all day pretty much. We were back in the cabin by 9 pm and it didn’t take long with the door open tonight to chill it down! We really enjoyed the day, and I think the excursion was "worth it" for us although I can see how the cost wouldn't be for a family. We saw several kids who were obviously pretty bored when we were waiting to get off. Seeing as we are thinking Alaska is a one time trip for us, I'm glad that we did it.

Here’s our cutie for the night – a cat maybe?

Coming up: Skagway

 

[bcwife76]

I think Glacier day is always my fave day. On our first cruise I had it booked for the 4 of us, then husband decided he didn't really want to go and that it would be a waste for the kids (who were 6&9) at the time so I ended up cancelling. I was disappointed but that year the Wonder got SO CLOSE to the glacier I didn't feel like I had missed out on too much. Cruise number two was a slightly different itinerary and our Glacier day was the same as Juneau day so the excursion wasn't even offered. Then last year I booked the explorer just for husband and I and I'm so glad we did it. He was grumbling about it at first (the ship gets close enough, the price is too high, what if the kids need us when we are on the excursion) but he LOVED it and actually said half way through he was so happy I had booked it. We bought that drink with the glacier ice (called a Glacierita) and a beer and the drink was quite sweet, I ended up drinking more of the beer lol.

Anyway, I digress, you got some amazing photos and I'm so glad you were able to experience this excursion!!!

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Wow! What a great day and what awesome pictures.

 

[ukintheus]

Cruise number two was a slightly different itinerary and our Glacier day was the same as Juneau day so the excursion wasn't even offered. Then last year I booked the explorer just for husband and I and I'm so glad we did it. He was grumbling about it at first (the ship gets close enough, the price is too high, what if the kids need us when we are on the excursion) but he LOVED it and actually said half way through he was so happy I had booked it. We bought that drink with the glacier ice (called a Glacierita) and a beer and the drink was quite sweet, I ended up drinking more of the beer lol.

I'm really curious what your itinerary was where you had glacier day and Juneau day all at the same time! Also glad that you did eventually get to go, and that you both really enjoyed it. I admit the Glacierita was tempting just say I'd had it but not tempting enough to drink a cold drink. We also really enjoyed Juneau and Sitka so we would be pushed to pick a favorite between those 3 days I think.

Wow! What a great day and what awesome pictures.

It was a great experience for sure, I can see how everyone says you have to do Alaska at least once.

 

[bcwife76]

It was our 2019 cruise, we went to Icy Strait Point, Skagway, Ketchikan and Juneau was a short day (I think we were there 7am-1pm??) and then on to the glacier. The ship didn't get anywhere NEAR as close as we did in 2017 and 2022 to the glacier and no excursion was offered due to time constraints so I felt badly for those who never got to fully experience the glacier.

 

[Annabell]

Lovely photos, thanks for sharing. All the memories coming back. We had a great time doing the Alaska cruise many years ago.

 

[ukintheus]

Thursday, September 14th – Skagway

Today we had an excursion booked for the Glacier Discovery Helicopter Tour (booked outside of DCL.) It was scheduled for noon and we were supposed to be at the helicopter base by 11:45 am. I knew that it was probably going to be a 50/50 chance of this being cancelled just based on the time of year that we were there, but I hopped out of bed at 7 am to check and see how the weather was looking.

Hmmm…we were still a little way from Skagway, so back to bed for a bit and play the wait and see game. We had a slow start and were out of bed and getting dressed around 8 am which was just after the ship docked and the first excursions started leaving.

Cabanas sounded good this morning and we grabbed a bite to eat at about 9 am, with the weather looking pretty overcast and drizzly. I love to try and get my version a “full english” breakfast if all the stuff is available. Yum!

Scott went for a selection of stuff and ditched his norm of an egg white omelet.

We went back to the cabin as it wasn’t looking too hopeful weatherwise for the helicopter excursions to go. We noticed that nothing had taken off, nor was there any real activity going on at the Temsco base. I called them and they said they hadn’t cancelled the noon excursion yet and to call back at about 10:30 am. OK, so to while away some time we decided to walk around Deck 4 for a bit to see what was going on.

Snow capped mountains were looking very dark with the gloomy skies, but a crew member told us later that day, that the snow hadn’t been there earlier in the summer. I’m never sure exactly how much to trust crew reports though.

Tide was out this morning.

There were two more cruise ships in town, so I was guessing the town would be fairly busy, but the rain was a variable, so no telling.

We saw this White Pass train at about 10 am but it didn’t look like it had any carriages.

It was about 10:30 am and so I made the call to Temsco to see what they had to say…cancelled…WHAT!! Seriously though, no great shock. We got ourselves bundled up and made our first attempt to disembark, which didn’t go as planned. The gangway this morning was off Deck 3 by Guest Services, which was a first for us. As we stepped off the ship, we realized it was bucketing down rain, so we got right back on and did a quick shuffle to get Scott’s camera into the backpack and just get ourselves better sorted and rainproofed. Finally, off the ship by 11 am and we decided to take the shuttle into town rather than walk in the pouring rain.

It’s a quick ride into town and the rain had eased off a bit. We pulled up Google Maps and walked a few blocks around the main shopping area.

The shops all seemed to be somewhat typical of shops you would find in any cruise port but we went into a couple looking for Christmas ornaments. I also wanted to try and find some gloves as mine were not waterproof and had started to get holes in them where I had been constantly pulling them off and on.

There were a lot of places that had cheap, generic, ornaments but we did find one place that had some wooden ones that were made in Alaska so I got one of those. We also found a store that had gloves, although no waterproof, but they were better than the ones I had. I think I wore them for about 30 mins that day, and then never wore them again. Typical! We aren’t big shoppers so we decided to try and find some places based off Google that looked like they might be interesting.

We passed the museum, but decided to circle back to it later.

We found the Skagway Sculpture and Flower garden, it took us a bit to find the entrance and then we realized why. Closed.



OK, no biggie, back to the City of Skagway Museum instead. Hmm….looks a little dark inside. Ahhh… Closed.

Nice looking building though.

And right next door was an old steam train that you could take a look at. There was a ramp that you could use to walk up and take a peek inside.

All of this touring around had taken us about an hour, and it was still drizzling rain off and on so we thought we may as well find somewhere to grab a bite to eat and get a drink and get out of the rain for a bit. The Skagway Brewing Co. fit the bill and was a short walk away, although everything is pretty much a short walk away in Skagway.

It was nice to get in the dry for a bit and sit down. We look a little damp here, but our clothes and feet were dry. This is where it would have been nice to have a waterproof backpack as some of the stuff in there was a bit damp, but it did have a waterproof pouch in it where Scott was keeping his camera.

There was an upstairs restaurant and then the bar restaurant downstairs. We elected for downstairs…it had the word bar in it.

I know I got the Spruce Tip Blonde, but I don’t remember what Scott got. It would have been easy to spend a couple of hours working our way through the cocktail menu – it looked really interesting!

The pub menu had fish and chips, with local Halibut, and that had been on my list of things to try so this worked out great. We decided to split it as it felt like breakfast hadn’t been all that long ago. It was piping hot, and the fish was good.

We were one and done on the drinks as we figured we would get the soggy part of the day over and finish up our look around the town before making our way back to the ship.

Another interesting thing about Alaska. Weed is legal and we actually walked past a couple of dispensaries that were noticeable (I didn’t notice any in Vancouver). Touristy photo of Camp Skagway.

 

[ukintheus]

While we were eating lunch we decided to stop at Red Onion and maybe grab a drink there. It was on the way back to the ship, so, why not.

It was packed though, we had trouble just even getting in the door! We ditched the idea of a drink but there was a brothel tour about to start so we figured we would see what that was all about.

We paid $10 each at the top of the stairs and there was an area where everyone waited for the tour to begin. Interesting art work throughout this place for sure – not sure it’s somewhere you would take the kids. I went through these photos and edited out all the “unsavory bits” as my Mum would have called them.

Memorabilia relating to the history of the place when it had been a saloon, gaming house, and brothel.

It was a very touristy tour, with all the kitschy things you would expect and they definitely had a tour narrative. Imagine Jungle Cruise banter but for a brothel and you’d be just about right.

Past these stairs led to the original upstairs of the place, which had some interesting history, and our guide had some interesting facts stuff to tell us about the place.

In the original brothel, they apparently used dolls to determine which of the ladies were available, and which were “busy”. Each of the current tour employees have made their own dolls….not going to lie…they were a bit creepy!

The whole way through this tour I kept thinking it would be a creepy place at night. The wallpaper is all original and there has been no restoration done. After we got home, I did some research and there are a lot of stories relating to hauntings in this place. I could totally see it.

Serious Haunted Mansion vibe going on in this hallway.

They had two rooms that had been set up to look how they may have looked back in the day.

This larger room had supposedly been used by the madam, Diamond Lil. She was quite a character and we got quite a lot of info on her. I looked stuff up when we got home and she was quite the interesting lady for sure.

The tour only lasts 10-15 minutes but it was something different, and seeing as just about everything else, except the shops, was closed down, we were at least able to say we actually saw some Skagway history. Despite having bought a round trip shuttle ticket, we decided to just walk back to the port as it was still only drizzling and we were in the mood to just keep ambling. The White Pass railroad was right at the end of the drag before you head back to the cruise ships.

Rain, what rain? Who cares?

This would be a great sign to pass on your way INTO town. We got it on our way out.

We stopped and read about the Princess Sofia. It had sunk in 1918 and they had quite a bit of information on it which was interesting, at least to me. It’s also interesting that it sank pretty much one week before my Dad was born. Crazy!

It was about a 10 minute walk back to the ship, give or take, and we were both ready to be back and in the dry right about now.

Ahhh…a warm toasty cabin with some cold chilled prosecco. Our CC gift had been delivered while we were gone. Bonus!

We shucked off all our damp outer gear, and hung the backpack up to dry. I gave it a blast for several minutes with the hair dryer to help it along, which actually worked surprisingly well. A quick look at the navigator told us that we were in time for trivia at 4 pm! First trivia question….where are you going to get your drink?!! The Crown & Fin bar was closed so Scott did a quick dash to French Quarter and got these.

It was a brain teasers trivia and we did OK, I had to bumble my way through the first three on my own, and surprisingly got two out of the three right!

With Crown & Fin not open, we left as soon as trivia was over. The gangway was still on Deck 3 and they had Goofy meeting people as they got on. It was pretty chilly in the atrium with the doors open.

French Quarter made a good plopping down spot.

But it was chilly even in there with the doors open in the atrium. Coffee with Baileys for me, which was nice, but the coffee wasn’t THAT hot, more like warmish. Maybe they had half coffee, half Baileys as it tasted pretty darned good!

We were chilly enough that it was a one and done there as well, and we figured we would just go back to the cabin for a little while before dinner. As we walked back through the atrium they had shut the door and apparently boarding was now taking place on Deck 2 as the tide was in, and the ship was higher. Soggy passengers waiting to get back onboard.

 

[ukintheus]

Scott spotted a seal in the water. Maybe it wasn’t so much spotted, as noticed what everyone else was looking at.

Haven’t done a selfie in a while so may as well take one of us without looking soggy.

The water level was definitely higher and you could see the muddier water from the inlet/stream/river (whatever it was.)

Time for us to get our happy butts down to Tiana’s for dinner. Tonight, it was a regional menu that was new to us.

We both got the Napa Valley Romaine Salad, mine had the cheese on it, so it looks (and tastes) better.

We shared the Grilled Halibut and the Maple-Glazed Pork Tenderloin. The halibut was on the dry side and not a lot of flavor, but the pork was good and the sweet potatoes that came with it were delicious.

Dinner entertainment by the Crawfish Crooners and our table was in a perfect place to enjoy them without them being too loud.

A pretty much failed attempt to get a good photo of Louis.

And here’s the dessert menu…and that’s all I’ve got because we both decided to skip dessert, although there’s several things on there that I bet were pretty good.

Another quick number by Tiana but we were going to bail pretty quickly on dinner tonight as we had a goal to achieve.

80’s music trivia! We managed to slide in there just before 7:30 pm and then spotted a couple that we had run into several times (from Bristol, TN btw), and we moved to share their booth so that we could free up the table for someone else.

We missed two or three and consequently came nowhere near to winning as they had a tie breaker for a couple of teams that got them all correct. Seeing as they rarely (never) change the music clips that speaks volumes for how awful our memories are! But, guess what, we remember where Cadillac Lounge is.

We ended up staying there for a couple of hours listening to two sets from the musician (name escaping me) and having a chat with Trent (cruise director) on his way through about the Australian sailings and various other tidbits.

This ended up being our latest night, I think it was close to 11 pm when we went to bed, and evidently neither of us remembered to take a photo of the towel animal. Considering we had a non-eventful day with our excursion being cancelled, we still made the most of it in Skagway. With no excursions, and if you aren’t into shopping though, then it’s definitely a place you can easily do in a couple of hours. I think in hindsight I would have picked an earlier helicopter tour time so that there is still time to scramble and maybe find something else if it cancels.

Coming up: Juneau

 

[bcwife76]

I'm sorry your excursion was cancelled, but it looks like you were able to salvage the rainy day in Skagway!

 

[ukintheus]

I'm sorry your excursion was cancelled, but it looks like you were able to salvage the rainy day in Skagway!

It was a fleeting moment of disappointment as we knew going into shoulder season that any excursion that is affected by weather is hit or miss. The nice part was getting that credit back on my credit card!