(Background Image: Mendenhall Glacier)
Sat. July 11 Got up at 1:15 to be sure and leave by 2:30 so we could be
in
Check-in was smooth after we figured out that Northwest uses
Delta’s check-in and Delta’ gates.
We leave from gate B-4 which is not that far down the concourse – a
deviation from the norm for us.
Plane left
FINALLY got to the line that would get us
on the ship – ANOTHER passport check – and then, when we got to the ship
check-in, there were no lines! Bus ride
to the ship was 40 min., but interesting.
Seems
Once
on the ship the only thing open was
We
did a boat tour – on our own – to see what was available. We were tired – had been up since 1:15 this
morning, but there was lifeboat drill at 5:15 and we didn’t want to sleep
through it. Amazing: they gave announcement at 25 min., 15 min.
and 5 min. to go pick up your life jackets; there were people who were late, a
couple never showed at all, and we had to stand outside crammed together while
they checked to be sure each person was there.
I was falling asleep standing there!
FINALLY it was over and we came back to the room and crashed. When we got up about 8:00 and headed for
Sun., July 12 Up about 7:00 (local time) and went up for breakfast. Weather has changed – very foggy, even misty;
I had to pull out sweater and socks. We
are going through a channel between islands, but all around us are rocky
islands covered with trees – very pretty with the fog, when we can see
them. Most of the day went the same
way. Sometimes we were out of the fog and
had beautiful views of mountains, some with small patches of snow. Then we would be in fog again. There was one waterfall right at the shore –
I got the video camera out for that because it was really pretty. We pretty well stayed in the room – Tommy
went up on top once without me as I wanted more clothes on before I went out. I finished my Harry Potter Book 7.
We’ve
set an alarm to get up at 5:00 tomorrow morning (Alaska time,
so 6:00 B. C. time) to go up on the bow and watch for whales. Supposed to be some that we
can see before the ship enters Tracey Arm. I went up and got some hot chocolate –
hopefully to soothe this acid reflux that has been bothering me.
Seas got rough when we pulled out from
between the islands about 6:00 tonight – I have really noticed the roll of the
ship, but have not had to take medicine.
Don’t think I’ll have to. Biggest
problem I have is I don’t really have a good way to keep my hair from blowing
in my face. OH, well.
Mon., July 13 We were up at 4:20 so we could be up in the
Crow’s Nest lounge to watch for whales.
We saw several spouts, saw the tail of one and
flipper of another. Also saw about 3
pods of dolphins. None of these really
broke the surface, but was neat to see.
We
stayed in the Crow’s Nest for the tour into Tracey Arm. Tracey Arm is a fjord with a glacier at the
end. We were hoping to get to see the
glacier, but there were too many ice floes in the water and the captain decided
to turn the ship around and leave before we got to the glacier. But the part that we saw was incredibly
beautiful! The walls of the fjord were
clearly glaciated, but had trees on parts of them. There was some snow in spots at the top and
its melting created waterfalls which snaked their way from the top of the
mountains to the bottom: one looked like
the tendrils of a spider’s web draped across the mountain side. One waterfall came out of the rocks, close to
the water’s edge – a beautiful, noisy cascade.
Some people saw a Harbor Seal around one of the ice floes, but we didn’t
see it. I moved from being inside the
Crow’s Nest to outside where it was colder and windy, but there was no glass in
the way to have reflections that ruined the pictures. It was hard to find a spot outside – people
were everywhere on deck taking pictures.
The Crow’s Nest had nice upholstered chairs, like desk chairs, up at the
windows and you were at the front of the ship, so the view was great, but you
were also comfortable. Got some really
good pictures, just didn’t get to see the glacier.
After we came back out of Tracy Arm – (the
entrance to which is VERY narrow and shallow though the water just over “the
bar” is over 700 feet deep!) we went on to Juneau, docking at 1:30 Alaska
time. We had been told by one of the
guest tour guides that we should skip the cruise ship tours and just get a cab
at the dock – negotiate a flat rate to go and do what we wanted as long as we
wanted. But we decided at the last
minute to do a cruise ship tour, however, when we got to the tours desk, they
were closed. So . . . back to the cab
idea. What we really wanted to do in
At the glacier it was AWESOME!!!!! Incredibly massive. There were two waterfalls: one came from under the glacier – it was
“dirty” looking. The other came from an
area to the side of the glacier, actually coming from snow melt on another
hilltop. The ranger came down and gave a
talk, explaining why the ice I sometimes blue (because as it is compacted it
eventually absorbs all light except the blue spectrum, so we see blue ice). She also explained that the reason the lake
water was a green-gray color was because the silt washed down from the glacier
– from the gray waterfalls – was so fine that it didn’t settle out, but
remained suspended in the water. Inside
the park headquarters they had some of the ash you could feel – it felt as soft
and “silky” as any woman’s face powder!
We spent the time we wanted at the glacier
and then caught one of our buses back to the dock. When we got to the dock, I did a little
shopping and we went back to the ship for supper and to pack as we could set
our big bags out for transfer tomorrow (we leave the ship at
Another note: contrary to our usual luck with weather, the
people here said this was the first sunny day in weeks – it was a PERFECT day!
Tues., July 14 We had to have our luggage – minus carry-on – outside our door by
1:00 this morning which meant we had to put a lot in our carry-on that we
normally would not have carried with us – like our toiletry kits and my gown
and house shoes and my morning tea cup.
We managed to get it all arranged and things repacked – as well as
pictures transferred from my camera card to the computer – before 11:30. We then fell asleep, but woke about
5:45: 30 min. before the alarm went
off. So we got dressed and got everything
packed into our 2 backpacks and the camera case while the ship was pulling into
Once we had everything packed, we left the
room for the last time and headed for breakfast in
We went to see the
From the cemetery we took a short hike up
to a GORGEOUS waterfall (Reid’s Falls:
you passed right by Frank Reid’s tombstone going up the trail – wonder
where they got the idea for the name of the falls???). Of course I had to take TONS of pictures – in
the cemetery AND at the falls!
After that we got back on the bus and
headed for a scenic overlook of
That was the end of our tour and
For a while we were not sure if we were
going to make it to the bridge: it
seemed like around every curve was a gorgeous waterfall or a mountain view that
was just incredible and there were pull-offs at all these places, so we would
no more than get started when we’d be stopping again! At one point we were seeing a lot of kettle
lakes – glacially formed depressions that hold water. Then we saw a large lake –
At another point – in fact at the highest
point on the road at 3292 feet – we saw a tour bus stopped and people focused
up on the hillside. About the time I saw
them looking I saw what they were looking AT:
a mountain goat high up on the hill.
So we turned around really quickly and went back for pictures. Using the video camera which has such a great
zoom we could see him moving around and grazing. WE had just said a little while before that
we should be watching for them and sure enough there was one.
We passed Canadian customs and went into
B. C. and eventually made it to the suspension bridge. This is a new construction – only been there
about 4 years – but has some really good interpretive displays on the way down
to the bridge. We got a personal tour as
there were no cruise tour buses stopped there at the
time. The wind when we were on the
bridge was ferocious! It could push you
off balance if you weren’t careful! They
had chain link fence up on the sides and the floor was metal grids, so it was
really safe. And the view of the rapids
below was AWESOME! Again, cloudy water,
but rapids that, our guide said, had defeated many attempts to run them: not something to attempt without a
We had asked the guide about how much snow
fell during the winter and he said 6 to 10 feet. We asked if that closed the road, but he said
there was an ore operation at the other end of the road and the trucks had to
haul the ore out to
We went a little father beyond the bridge
and decided we needed to get back because we had to put gas in the car before
turning it in, and we didn’t know when the gas stations would close. When we got back to
Coming back to the car, we decided to find
a place to eat and wound up at Northern Lights Café – good food even if it was
a little expensive. But all of
When we finally turned the car in and got
to our hotel room, we found that we truly are in
Wed., July 15 We were up at 5:00 – I was, anyway, to wash my hair. We had to have our luggage outside our room
by 6:30 and we had to meet our tour guide at 7:45. We got breakfast in the hotel and then got
our “carry-on” bags and met our tour guide.
We boarded a bus for the 5 min. ride to our train, the White Pass &
Yukon Railroad. It began its run along
the
As
we pulled into the camp, we saw a bear behind one of the outbuildings. We got pictures of the bear first, and then
went inside to eat. The food was
delicious, and, after the meal, we had time to take a walk on the nearby
trails. We went up to a Presbyterian
Church building which was the only building left form the gold rush days of
turn of the century. There was an
elaborate sprinkler system set up outside the building in case of forest fire;
they are serious about preserving this piece of history.
Beyond the church we went up a trail to
At Carcross we
go toff the train and boarded our bus with our driver
“Jen” and she drove us to White Horse.
ON the way we saw a desert that had been created by glaciers millennia
ago. We stopped at
When we got to our hotel, the room was
warm, but they had a fan going. We put
our bangs down (our luggage was outside the door) and then headed for Giorgio’s
Restaurant for Italian. We split a meal
(our guide had suggested it) and it was delicious. While we were waiting for our food, Tommy
went looking to see if he could find a store where we could get some chocolate
milk to help my reflux. In the process,
he passed a movie theater and saw a line waiting to see the new Harry Potter
(6) movie. So after we ate, we went to
the theater and got in line. We met a
man and his daughter and began talking with him. Learned he was a square dancer. But just before we got in the door , they put up a sign saying no more tickets for Harry
Potter. But we knew there was a later
show, but didn’t want to stand in line 2 hours, so we approached the window in
our turn and asked if there were Harry Potter tickets and the girl said yes –
7, but not together – we said it didn’t matter, we’d take two. So we got to see Harry Potter and the Half
Blood Prince in White Horse,
Thurs., July 16 Bags out at 6:30 then breakfast and meet in the lobby at
8:00. We are 3rd group in our
tour to get on the bus (tomorrow we’ll be 2nd, then 1st,
the back to 3, etc.). After a short tour
of White Horse we are on the road again – first the AlCan Highway and then
We were mostly in Taiga forest: spruce, spent, and birch. Mountains were in the distance, but sometimes
we’d have kettle lakes or small rivers to add interest.
Our first stop was at Braeburn
Lodge,
Then we were back on the road and passing
through areas which had been hit by forest fires. The first one was in 1998 and there were
really no spruce to be seen, but a lot of aspen. Jen, our guide/driver, said the spruce would
take longer, but eventually they would dominate the area. She said the roots of the aspen spread out in
a wide area and if you checked DNA you would find the trees in a wide area to
be related. The spruce, of course, have
seeds that are only released with fire, so allowing the fires to burn naturally
is beneficial to the forest.
We then stopped at Five Fingers rapids
which was a dangerous spot on the
Our next stop was for lunch at Minto’s Resort – a group of cabins on the
Back on the road we played a “migrate your
moose” game where Scott told us what part of a moose to draw and we’d draw that
part and then”migrate our mosse”
to the person behind us, then we’d draw another part, etc. When we finished – and named it – we could
then write a poem about the picture we wound up with. I wrote a limerick:
There once was a moose name
sad
Whose
proportions were all kind of bad
With legs of blue
And
no antlers too
It’s
probably best if he’s never a dad.
Our next stop was Moose Creek Lodge – a nice place with
much interesting primitive art and antiques around. Back on the road, we are on a road under
construction – at least it is not blacktopped but gravel with ruts.
Getting closer to
We arrived in Dawson City about 5:30 local
time and got our room in the Westmark Inn (same name
as the hotels in Skagway and White Horse – owned by Holland America), room 201
– no elevator in this one. Our bags were
outside our door shortly after we arrived.
We went looking for a place to eat and wound up at Sourdough Joe’s where
we got sandwiches.
We
went back to the hotel to look into tours for the next day – we had wanted to
go to Tombstone Territorial Park, but it is far out of town and the road across
it is very long; there were two tours – one 6 ½
hours and one 7 ½ hours. Tommy
said he didn’t want to spend that much time on a bus. We had tried to phone what we though was the
local tourist info center, but it was closed, so from what we could tell we
were going to have to use the Holland America tours service. Later, after walking around town, we stumbled
across the REAL local tourism place and it was open. They had several tours that we MIGHT have been
able to get but unfortunately by that time they were all closed. There are no car rental agencies here, and
the only transportation we could find were bikes, so we had to choose something
that would provide us with transportation.
We finally decided on a rafting tour on the
Fri., July 17 We slept late today – didn’t get up till
after 9:00. We had decided to try
breakfast at the China Restaurant which had a $5.99 special. Food turned out to be very good.
One thing I neglected to point out about
We finally went on our tour at 4:30. The water was fast moving – faster than the
We finally got to he
end of the trip where the Klondike emptied into the
Back at our hotel, we checked e-mail and
then Tommy went out to find some supper (I wasn’t hungry). He came back with a couple of sandwiches fro
the Shell quick mart across the street and that was our supper.
Sat., July 18 We had to have bags out at 6:30, so were up at 6:00. Got the bags out and then headed for the
China Restaurant for breakfast again.
After that we went back to the room for a quick snooze, and then on the
bus for a quick ride down to the dock to get on the catamaran, Yukon Queen II. Of course this is a fancy boat with airplane
type seats with try back s and a permanent tray between the seats that doubled
as an arm rest. Our trip down the Yukon
River was VERY smooth and VERY uneventful – which you could say
was good and bad: nothing bad happened
which was good, but nothing spectacular happened which was not good – no moose,
elk, eagles or any other animals of any description besides Ravens and gulls. Just the murky silty, swiftly moving Yukon River which in many places
resembled the
We crossed the border back into
Sun., July 19 Up at 6:00 to get bags out by 6:45. Had breakfast at the Grumpy Griz –
nothing spectacular, just eggs and toast, but at a reasonable price. Then back on the bus for our trip to
Also today our TD, Scott, told us what his
job was when he wasn’t doing Holland America tours (he had been giving us clues
and we had been guessing for 2 days): he
organizes golf outings for corporate groups; he had pictures of himself in a
variety of places and named some VERY prominent people that he had
“associated” with in the course of his other work.
Our ride today was still kind of same ol, same ol, but we did cross several rivers of a type they called
“braided” rivers: they were rivers which
had wide, level beds and they tended to meander in several splits through the
width of the bed, often changing their channels as they did so. The first of these was the
We could see mountains in the distance on
both sides of us, but the air was hazy:
there are over 60 wildfires still burning in
Our first stop was at Rikka’s
Roadhouse. This is a historic site but
has a museum, store, and café as well as other historic buildings. It had been an important trade stop for the stampeders and then later had been used by the
We got to see a video about the building
of the AlCan Highway in
1942: it had been deemed critical for
the defense of
We did finally get to see a moose! She (we think – there was no rack, but that
would not be important) was stepping out of a small pond and moving back into
the trees on the far side of it. The
driver did a good job of slowing down for us to take pictures – though there
was no traffic to worry about at the time.
For lunch we stopped at God Dredge #8 national
Historic Site.
They had tables set up in an old mess hall there and had a miner’s stew,
blueberry crumble, and biscuits – it was very good. After the meal we got to tour the dredge (it
is HUGE!) and then they gave us each a bag of soil from the “tailings”
from the dredge work and we “panned” for gold.
Tommy got 6+ grains and I got 5; about $34.00 worth all together. That was VERY interesting and worth
the stop even without the food and tour!
We then stopped at the
After that we had a tour of
We then got to our hotel – Westmark Inn again – and were ready to relax. Tommy scouted around and found there was a
place across the street called “Iris Café & Saloon” which had a reasonable
sounding special. We decided to go there
and ordered a 16 oz. prime rib to split.
The waiter brought out 2 exactly same plates: he put the order in for 2 8 oz. steaks and
then still let us each have a potato, salad and veggies. All for the price of the
single plate. The food was DELICIOUS!!! Meat was tender as were the veggies and
potato. We HIGHLY recommend the
Iris Café & Saloon to anyone going to
Back in the room, I’ve transferred the
pictures from the camera and am ready for bed:
9:45 and sun is still well up in the sky!
Mon., July 20 Forty years ago astronauts landed on the moon. Tommy was working at Camp Mack Morris and I
was refinishing Aunt Sarah’s trunk which is the brown, rectangular trunk which
held our music for a long time. I was
stenciling the name “Claxton” on the front of it while watching the TV coverage
of the moon landing (it would be another 13 days before we would be married,
but I figured I was safe in “branding” the trunk as “ours”). I also remember that Lily and Jim – the
tenant couple who lived on our farm in Fayette Co. – did not believe that man
had gone to the moon: they and many
other poor people with little education – thought it was just a trick of
television.
Today we were up at 5:00 because we had to
have our bags out at 6:00 to leave at 7:00.
Today we rode the train from
We had much the same scenery that we had
had on the bus, but this time there were views of meadows with many
muskegs: pools of water where ice melts
but permafrost doesn’t let it sink down any further. These meadows and muskegs were ideal places
for moose. I think in all there were
probably 4 or 5 moose sighted though I only saw a couple of them and Tommy may
have seen 4.
One area we went through was part of the
2004 fire. Jane said someone threw his
ashes from a fire out in the woods thinking the ashes were cool, but they
weren’t and they started the fire. There
was a lot of fire weed in this area – as it is the first plant to come back
after a fies.
Huge meadows of this with the
One thing we did get to see was one of the
old NORAD stations – or at least the 3 radar screens in the distance. They were HUGE – Jane gave us the
statistics but I don’t recall them except that they were really huge1 They have now been turned over the Alaska
National Guard; new technology has replaced the old radar system.
We entered
When the train arrived at the station at
Back in the room we lay down to rest, but
I began to have some serious pain of indigestion. I had been having some trouble for several
days, and had been drinking chocolate milk to settle the acid reflux I was
having. The pain was just too much and I
told Tommy I needed to find a Dr. There
was a clinic next to the main lodge, so he went downstairs and asked about
it. The lady said it had closed at 6:00
and she didn’t think they took out of state insurance, and they were
expensive. So we decided to try
something else – we took the computer out to the balcony at the end of the hall
where we could get internet and looked up hiatal
hernia, which was what I thought might be the problem. We decided that maybe Zantac might help, so
Tommy went back to the general store and came back with Zantac. In the meantime I had decided that sitting up
was better than lying down, so I am sitting up until I feel that the food I ate
earlier is not at the upper part of my stomach.
Tues., July 21 Today we were scheduled for an early jeep tour: we got the jeep and drove it wherever we
wanted, with a few restrictions. We
decided to go south as the man told us we might see more wildlife that
way. We didn’t find out till we were
well on the road that since that area was out of the park, it was primarily
private land and people didn’t want you walking out across it. We saw some beautiful mountains and saw a
LITTLE of Denali (
We came back to the hotel, got Subway
sandwiches for lunch and then met at 2:00 for our Tundra Wilderness Tour. That was INCREDIBLE!!!!! It took us far into the park, beyond the
paved road on a gravel road. We were on
a school bus: the guide (Sarah –
originally from
Wednesday, July 22 This was our last day in Denali – we head
out on the train for
LONG
train ride to
The train trip was mostly through a wide
valley with some good views of rivers.
We didn’t see much wildlife, though after we were inside the city limits
of
We saw the town of
There was also the smallest town in
We arrived in
Thurs., July 23 Today we go on a city tour and a tour to
After that we went to the
We left the heritage center and went back
to the hotel to pick up a couple who had opted not to go to the
The mountains were beautiful – very steep
and pretty with tops that were above the alpine level. There were pockets of snow and even a couple
of small glaciers (the glaciers are blue – snow peaks are white). There were LONG waterfalls in many
areas. Gavin told us
We finally turned away form the Sound and
headed up between some mountains into
We finally reached
Finally we headed back to the dock and then
back to our hotel. Tonight we had our
“farewell differ” – all had a good time.
We are packed and ready – bags have to be out at 4:00 a.m. and we leave
for the airport at 5:00.
Fri., July 24 Bags out at 4:00!! Caught
bus at 5:00 and were at the airport before 5:30. Our flight left on time – 7:45 local
time. We had a smooth flight, but saw
mostly clouds below us the whole way except going over the Canadian
When we landed in
At our gate, only two other people were
there when we arrived: the current Miss
When
we arrived in