Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 10: Home

7/15/17

Well, all good things must come to an end and whatnot.  We checked out early, caught our ride to the airport and flew home to Dallas.

Goodbye Mt. Rainier

Goodbye cloud and green hills and valley with winding river

Goodbye mountaintop lakes

Hello DFW Airport

Hello heat :(

AT&T Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys

Actually there's quite a lot of attractions in this area

And that wraps up our Alaskan cruise.  I'll sum up with these thoughts:  We had a great time with John and Norma and are so glad we got to go with them.  The experience of cruising up the inland passage to Alaska was great - relaxing, amazing sights, great weather, terrific excursions.  The experience the cruise line offered while on the ship was fine; it was about what I expected except for the constant pushing of merchandise.  They really went the full QVC while we were trapped on board.

Seattle was already on my list of places to go, but now that we've had a taste it's been bumped up to a higher priority.  We've agreed that we want to explore the city more, spend time outside the city enjoying nature, and road-tripping from there to Vancouver.  We'll have to make that happen soon.

I would definitely like to spend more time in Alaska as well, mainly hiking and exploring.  There's so much natural beauty there that it's hard to imagine how we would choose where to go and what to do.  When we go back we most likely will fly in instead of cruising again, giving us more time to explore on our own.  The same goes for Victoria, British Columbia.  That looked like a fun town to spend some time exploring, and we've got to spend more time at the amazing Butchart Gardens.

Wow, the destination list just keeps growing.  We'll have to balance new discoveries with revisiting favorites.

Thanks for sticking around.  Next up will be our first trip to the Grand Canyon, so I'll see you then!

Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 9: Seattle

July 14, 2017, our last morning on board the ship.  We stayed in Seattle for the day and left for home the next morning.

4am:  Edmonds, WA

5:15am:  Seattle

Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 8: Victoria, British Columbia

7/13/17

A lot of pictures for this post, so I'll cut down on the minutia.

On this morning we docked in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.  John would stay onboard while Norma, Todd and I had an excursion to Butchart Gardens and Craigdarroch Castle.  We met Norma at her room at 8:45 then headed down our designated excursion post in the Palace Theater on deck 5.  They grouped by excursion type, then when the time came we left the ship in groups to board the buses.

Our guide and driver took us through Victoria first, then on to our first stop.  We arrived at Butchart Gardens at 10am, and it was incredible.  We had 1 1/2 hours to tour the gardens, but in hindsight we should have spent all day there, it was that amazingly beautiful.

After the gardens the bus took us back to Victoria at 12:30 where we toured Craigdarroch Castle which is not really a castle, but a storied old house/mansion.  It was interesting, but paled compared to the previous stop.  We spent an hour at Craigdarroch then drove back through Victoria to the port.

Sunrise view

Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 7

7/12/17 - A day at sea.

There was no scheduled port of call for this day as we sailed toward Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.

5:09am

20 minutes later

Another shot

Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 6: Endicott Arm Fjord & Dawes Glacier

7/11/17

A new sight outside our window this morning as we head up (down?) the Endicott Arm Fjord on the way to Dawes Glacier:

Is that...?

...it is.  Ice.
(Lots of ice pics coming up - nyuk, nyuk, nyuk)

Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 5: Skagway

7/10/17

On this morning we made our 2nd port of call:  Skagway, Alaska.

The view from our balcony at 5am this morning

I believe that small town on the water's edge is Haines, Alaska

Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 4: Juneau, Part 2

Continued from the previous post.

That's the Mount Roberts Tramway.  You can just make out the tram near the top in the photo.  Riders board a gondola at at the docks and ride to the top where there are scenic views, hiking opportunities, a nature center, shop, restaurant and more.

Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 4: Juneau, Part 1

July 9th - Port of call:  Juneau, Alaska

On this morning we were still under power with a noon arrival in Juneau.  We crossed time zones and gained an hour so I was up earlier than usual.  It was about 55 degrees and the sky was overcast with a light rain - perfect weather for traveling north in my opinion.

I put on my shorts, t-shirt and hoodie to go walking and left Todd sleeping.  Since it was raining too much to walk on the track on deck 11 I went down to deck 4 - the outside area there (where the lifeboats are) encircles the entire ship and is almost completely covered.  I don't think I've already posted it, so I've included a cutaway of the ship's layout below.

This morning's view from our stateroom.  Love it.

Deck 4 with the lifeboats hanging above

I've drawn this handy diagram to show...
Just kidding.  Picture from royalcaribbean.co.uk

Alaskan Cruise 2017 - Day 3

July 8th - Our first full day at sea.

This morning's view from our balcony

A couple of hours later and the surface of the water is ridged/rippled