Author: admin (Page 13 of 31)

Day 18 Juneau 19.05.2023

20 May 2023 / admin

State capital of Alaska and improbably only accessible by air or sea! During the gold rush it was the landing spot for those seeking to dig up a buck in the hills inland so due to the fluctuating population it became the capital. There was a plan to move the capital to Anchorage but there is no money to fund the relocation.

Two highlights today, one planned, the other happenstance. Our planned visit to a dog mushing location to meet some Alaskan huskies which have less fur than the Siberian version. There are three teams harnessed up, each team has a six seater buggy at the rear and the musher rides at the back of the buggy. We climb aboard and set off round the loops about three times covering about a mile. The dogs are not going flat out but the weight of the buggy is much more than the traditional musher sled.

There is then an opportunity to pet and fuss the dogs. One of them flops on Jackie’s foot for a belly rub. Later by the time we depart and new visitors have arrived the dogs are clearly keen to do it all again.

We move onto a lecture on the history of the Iditarod which was largely invented to prevent dog sledding disappearing from the planet. Our musher runs around 40 dogs and whilst breeding stopped during covid it is now in progress again and the tourists are back in numbers. The talk covers the huge changes in safety, vet checks and dog wear (including boots) which have been implemented over the years, along with required breaks and these days gps trackers on each sled!

There is also mention of the Nome run. There was a diphtheria outbreak in Nome in 1925 and only the mail mushers could get supplies of drugs delivered in highly adverse weather conditions. The story is unknown in the UK but is well told by Wikipedia. An amazing feat of endurance by dogs and mushers to deliver the drugs.

Whilst there is no longer a need for mushers to move mail around Alaska the race and centres such as this ensure there is reason to keep the skills alive and sustain the breed.

Day 17 Hubbard Glacier 18.05.2023

19 May 2023 / admin

We awake this morning and notice in the far distance a small boat which is emerging from a close encounter with the Hubbard Glacier which we can see in the even further distance. Over an hour later the small boat turns out to be a decent size cruising ship – not as large as our Seven Seas – but still pretty large. Meanwhile the Hubbard Glacier is even larger.

Our ship enters initially Yakutat Bay and then getting closer to the glacier is Disenchantment Bay into which the Glacier discharges – with other glaciers also reaching the sea at this point. We have to assume that much of the grey land left and right was once covered by these glaciers as they are now retreating.

It is impossible in either my words or the photograph to convey the sheer size of the glacier as there is no real scale – however another photo may give some indication

The ship at the bottom left is much larger than it appears – we are still a long way out from the small icebergs which you can see in the first photograph to give some idea of comparative scale.

Day 16 Seward 17.05.2023

18 May 2023 / admin

Seward is a rather more grown up place, it even has a rail link to Anchorage which is the largest city in Alaska but not the state capital, which is Juneau. It counts as our first stop on the Alaskan mainland.

One benefit of being on the mainland is that transport today is by a standard coach, not a school bus. Like the other ports we have visited there is a heavy dependence on the fishing industry to underpin local activity.

Our trip today actually has two highlights. Initially we head into the countryside to see the Exit Glacier. Compared with our experience of the Athabasca Glacier (in Canada) this one is slightly underwhelming. What is dispiriting is that much of the drive to the viewpoint is alongside the grey ground which the retreating glacier leaves behind as it retreats / shrinks having ground the rocks over the thousands of years the glacier was slowly flowing over the land. On the way we pass the “Salmon Bake” bar; apparently the local moose can gather and prevent potential customers leaving their cars (or the bar to get to their cars which I suspect is engineered by the bar owner)!

At the other end of Seward is a Sea Life centre (probably center) which has a wide range of local fish and sea birds, one of the latter seems to be particularly keen on being caught by camera. We use the local bus to return to the ship.

Day 15 Kodiak Alaska 16.5.2023

17 May 2023 / admin

We wake to find ourselves moored close to Kodiak as expected. What is not expected is blue sky and sun shining so after a number of drab days it feels more like holiday and holiday weather.

Kodiak is an island famous for particularly bears which are native to the island. We are taken, this time in a “First Student” bus, around the town being shown the main highlights (including Safeway) as well as a couple of very attractive views. No bears are spotted. Kodiak is a large island compared with many others off of Alaska mainland and it is an attractive spot – at least with the sun shining as today.

Just opposite the town is Near Island – a simple name for the next nearest piece of land! We can watch the planes landing and taking off from Kodiak Benny Benson State Airport which is away to the right as we look out at the sea.

On return to the ship it is sufficiently warm for us to sit by the pool and enjoy the warm sun, indeed I end with a touch of sunburn on my nose, although I am not tempted to remove many layers – but it is nice to be out of doors and feeling some warmth.

Day 14 Sea Day 15.5.2023

16 May 2023 / admin

Seven seas explorer

Sea days tend to revolve around staying awake, we cannot sleep properly at night and can drop off just about anywhere during the day.

At one point we have a very cold night as the heating has simply stopped working, turns out that it had tripped out from working too hard. Once reset the temperature improves.

The masking tape on the balcony door has been removed and the whistling reduced. A further complaint means a visit from an engineer with a hammer, followed by some hammering and the whistling does then seem to go away.

Finally the television seems unwilling to talk to the network at any time to which the solution is a couple of technician visits, the first to remove the television and to bring a new one and thereafter we largely have a working box.

With a lot of spare time, we have had been watching a lot of news programmes, the choices being mainly BBC and Sky. Odd moments spent watching Fox News add little enlightenment.

Day 13 Dutch Harbor 14.5.2023

15 May 2023 / admin

Russian Orthodox Church

Our first landfall on this side of the Pacific is the tiny outpost of Dutch Harbor which can just about find room for cruise ship amongst the fish processing plants. The cruise port is on the small island of Amaknak which is Bridge linked to the main island of Unalaska and was named simply because there was a Dutch boat in the harbor! The main port was initially developed by the Russians and it was later one of the few locations in the USA bombed in WW2.

One of the stranger oddities is that we are on “ship” time which is an hour adrift from local Alaska time. We had not anticipated this and had advanced our watches to local time so until we discover our mistake we are running an hour early. However our planned breakfast restaurant was not open simply because we are too early, the first world problems of cruise ship passengers!

On disembarking before going completely cabin stir crazy the first sight is of an eagle sat nearby plus further examples soaring overhead. The second sight was a somewhat dirty school bus which constitutes the available local transport.

The bus takes us to the sights, a WW2 museum, the Safeway store, the Museum of the Aleutians and the Russian Orthodox Church. We do the last round trip simply because it was the only one planned to visit the church as earlier it would be in use. However we cannot attempt to see the interior as we are concerned about vehicle capacity to get everyone back on board as the bus timetable has become disrupted.

Time to move on and we swing back south of the chain of Aleutian Islands and continue heading West. Talking of time it is a 23 hour day and from tomorrow we shall be on true Alaska time.

Day 12 Sea Day 13.5.2023

14 May 2023 / admin

RSSC Explorer

We are now tracking to the south of the Aleutian islands which is a very long island archipelago which stretches south westerly in a very long arc from the mainland.

Jackie is disappointed as once again there are not enough takers for the games of bingo – it seems that they schedule them at the same time as the major lectures in the theatre so there is a split of those on board between the two events – so no bingo for Jackie.

The lectures are recorded and can be watched on one of the television channels in our cabin at another time – so people could go to the bingo – but perhaps the passengers are not that keen on a little flutter.

Never mind the on board food and drink continues to flow, as does the toilet! Talking of the food the various restaurants on board publish their daily menus onto one of the television links and we can think about what we shall eat later during the day – and seeing the possibilities sometimes determines where we will eat in the evening.

Sleep patterns are poor, the bedding and heating system combining to be too hot when under the sheet and quilt whilst too cold if on top of the covers. Added to which my left knee seems to provide discomfort at almost any time – it seems to be playing up more than at home.

I am unable to concentrate sufficiently to read despite having brought a lot of reading material. Over the holiday I just about manage a couple of chapters of one book and not a lot else.

Day 11 Sea Day 12.5.2023 Day 2

13 May 2023 / admin

International Date Line

If you read that correctly you may wonder what on earth is happening. The answer is the International Date Line. We have had to reset our calendars to yesterday, although the cabin clock does not show the date, although we did not physically cross the line until this afternoon it is easier to consider it an overnight change like the hours. So we have moved from 11 hours ahead of London to being 11 hours behind. Yes it is very confusing, it is still Friday!

We awake to find it is 09:30 according to our adjusted watches and resetting my phone is the first job.

Film of the day in the theatre is unsurprisingly “Groundhog Day” but we will not be going to see it. There are competitions this morning and we participate in a couple of them and win some tickets but they do not turn into prizes.

We are having a long run of sea days because the original itinerary included one port in Eastern Russia but the outbreak of the war with Ukraine led to one of the many rejigs of this particular holiday. There were a number of others – the sailing date was changed, various ports changed and one day was removed completely. It is something like the original cruise – but not quite! Post covid a lot of re-jigging was needed and the ship is going to undergo some work in Vancouver as there are a number of engineers aboard.

We know the ship needs attention as the saga of the cabin infrastructure continues. I had hopes that I could connect to the suite television from my phone to play some of the soaps (to fill in the sea days) once they download. The data source for the phone is an internal network but there is no obvious link between the public wifi and the television network but my investigations dislodge the network cable which, like the door to the balcony, is secured using duct tape.

Additionally the toilet was unable to cope with our prodigious output and becomes blocked, so our afternoon sleep is disrupted by a veritable phalanx of various engineers to address the problems. The most effective engineer is the plumbing type person who waggles something externally, enters, flushes and assures us the blockage has been resolved.

Day 10 Sea Day 12.5.2023

13 May 2023 / admin

RSSC Explorer

We continue on the same heading of 73 degrees so roughly north westerly as we have been on this heading since leaving Kushiro more or less continuously as we head in the general direction of Alaska. After all the state is too big to miss!

At lunchtime we have a special meal in Pacific Rim restaurant and there are 5 accompanying matching wines. All excellent and the inevitable follow up of a post prandial snooze which then means it is now time for dinner and a lighter option is consumed. The bad news about cruises is the excellent food and wine.

Having received some emails which ought to be answered I decide to make use of a proper screen and keyboard in the business centre on deck 5. I get connected and then seek to access office 365. Multi-factor authorisation is in place on the account so Microsoft wants to send me a text message. No hope. I knew there was a good reason not to have MFA and here it is! And it has also logged me out of the resources at home so I am cut off from Office 365. We really are out of touch with the normal world.

Time is wasted watching television, in particular the news channels which are endlessly covering “Title 42” an expiring piece of US legislation which may or may not alter how refugees may enter the USA from Mexico. No one actually seems to know what difference it will make!

We are going to lose two hours tonight making this a 22 hour day which is only one of the many confusing aspects in our Pacific transit.

Having had our sliding balcony door taped up with vast quantities of masking tape, the cold wind continues to breeze into our suite and so we turn up the heating system. The hot air inlet is in the ceiling of the lounge area whilst the cold air is entering at floor level. Thermodynamic theory says hot air rises so feet are permanently cold.

Day 9 Sea Day 11.5.2023

12 May 2023 / admin

Seven Seas Explorer

Post-breakfast this morning we head into the Constellation theatre to have most of our pre-conceptions about Alaska disabused. – or at least so the speaker claims, based on being resident there and experiencing some of the low winter temperatures.

It remains a large state with the long stretch of Aleutian Isles meaning that it stretches to touch the four boundaries of the main 48 states of the USA if overlaid on it. Most of the limited population resides around Anchorage with huge unoccupied areas which was largely in accordance with our preconceptions!

Much else is not true. No igloos, nose rubbing is not kissing and no one quite knows how many words might mean a form of snow as different wordsmiths have separate totals! And most residents no longer and never did have dog sleds; the Iditarod being created to keep the tradition alive and has ensured the survival of the Alaskan husky which has thinner fur than the Siberian. We will come back to huskies later on our journey.

We are unlikely to see the Northern Lights as the immediate forecast band is much further north. Yes you read that right, they publish forecasts for the location of the Northern Lights and if we had come when originally planned the odds would be far better!

The ship is making steady progress across the north Pacific. Today is a little less stable with some definite rock and roll overnight leading to us waking several times. Walking is a little more complex as the floor does not seem to be where it should be when you put a foot down. Outside it is pretty misty and visibility is very limited.

Another day passes.