Alaskan Cruise Day 4: Juneau, Alaska

We were early birds again and started with a quick-ish breakfast at Garden Café.  We got to talk to Brandi for a bit, and it seems like they are having a great time J   

We got off the ship as soon as we could, grabbed a taxi, and got up to the Mendenhall Visitor Center by 7:30.  

In the picture below, Nugget Falls is to the right of Mendenhall Glacier--that's the first hike we took!

We were the first ones there and made the most of it!  We felt like we won a leg of “The Amazing Race!”  

We took some pictures at the scenic viewpoint, walked around right around the main area, and then we took off on the Nugget Falls Trail.  

It was a short trail, but some parts of it were flooded, so we manned up and waded through the puddles!  Rolled up pants and wet shoes and socks were totally worth it!  The views of the glacier with the waterfall next to it were amazing!  

We hiked over the really big rocks, and Josh went all the way to get a better look at AJ Falls.  We hiked back to the Visitor Center and started on the East Glacier Trail, a 3 ½ mile hike way up above Nugget Falls.  

There was another pretty view at the beginning of the hike, and then it was such a unique rainforest atmosphere, like in Ketchikan.  

It was really fun to stand over the falls and see what we had just seen a short while ago.  Yesterday, Josh has several earth caches on his to-find list, but there were also a couple of regulars.  We spent a few minutes searching for one, and we finally admitted defeat, only to find out later we just weren’t high enough on the trail!  He was able to add the smiley once we stopped at a scenic overlook later.  We did see several tour-led groups, but it definitely wasn’t overcrowded.  

The climb down the mountain did take quite a bit of time, and we were both anxious to move on to our next activity.  We were SO pleased with our choice of how to spend our time in Juneau!  Mendenhall Glacier was beautiful from every angle we saw it, the falls were so pretty to see and listen to, the water was pretty to watch as it had interesting shaped calves of the glacier floating around.  

We finally got a taxi ride back to downtown, but we didn’t have as much time as we thought we would to do “town stuff.”  We raced over to find a cache and read about Patsy Ann, a dog who loved welcoming the cruise boats to Juneau in the early 1900s.  She much preferred roaming around town to being a typical family dog, and she was adopted by the whole town.  The cruise ships did not run on regular schedules like they do now, and even though Patsy Ann was deaf, she always knew when one was approaching port.  We HUSTLED back to the ship for all aboard—ours was the farthest docked ship L  We actually had to run about a mile up the road because we didn’t realize how far away the ship was from Downtown—standing in Downtown, it looked like it was right around the corner…  We did get to see an eagle perched on a pole during our hustle, so that’s a win!

Once back on board, we unloaded in our room and then went to lunch in The Garden Café.  We ran into Mom and Dad, and luckily, we were able to eat together; the lunch area was packed!  After lunch, we moved with Mom up to Spinnaker Lounge to relax and watch the beautiful scenery.  We all met to play cards, but we only lasted a few hands because that’s when we started cruising through Tracy Arm towards Sawyer Glacier.  

Josh and I scored amazing seats at the front of the boat on Deck 13.  We were right up against the glass above the wheelhouse and seeing where we were headed first-hand.  

EVERYTHING was amazing and like nothing we’d seen before.  

Approaching the glacier, there were many icebergs floating in the water (they are fun to guess what shape they are like clouds), tons of waterfalls ensconced in the mountainsides, and surprisingly beautiful weather.  

Sawyer Glacier was gorgeous with lots of blue coloring.  We were lucky enough to see a chunk calve off while we watched!  

The ship cruised towards the glacier and then the captain turned the boat in a slow circle so everyone was able to see everything from any spot on the ship.  A super nice lady lent us her binoculars and told us where to look to see seals!  We were able to see a few mountain goats as we cruised back our of the fjord, but still no bears L  

After we turned around and headed away from the glacier, we got ready for dinner.  We met at 8:30 in Azura, which was really good.  It was working out really well that we all did different excursions, because we had lots to share at dinner!

An elephant towel!

Alaskan Cruise Day 3: Ketchikan, Alaska

We were up early for our first day in Alaska!  

After a quick breakfast at Garden Café, we made sure to take a picture of Josh with Ketchikan in the background to celebrate his 50^th state!!!  

We got off the boat after having our picture taken with an eagle J   There were fun photo ops each day, and it didn't occur to me that they were all sponsored by Norwegian, so if I wanted any of those pictures we had to buy them all!  I would have loved a fun collection of cheesy pictures, but I'm pretty sure Josh is just find not having those souvenirs... ;)  

We pretty much headed right over to the lumberjack show where we were divided into two sides: Dawson Creek (Canada) vs. Spruce Mill (USA).  This was Mom and Dad’s first stop of the day too before they continued on the Totem Bight Totem Pole tour.  

Each team had two lumberjacks to root for, and we learned a special cheer.  

The lumberjacks competed in eight different events, and Dawson Creek ended up winning (that was our side)!  The whole show was really fun—a great start to our time in Alaska!  

We took off on our own after the show for an original geocaching tour of Ketchikan!  

We started right around town finding several caches, including many that gave us pretty views of the water and all of the fishing boats.  

I was really proud of myself for finding a particularly tricky one—it was a green magnet sheet on a green power box with a page protector underneath holding the log!  We walked along Creek Street (the famous street that once held many brothels) and saw thousands of salmon swimming in the creek and up the salmon ladder.  

We took a short walk to the Totem Heritage Center where there was a neat cache hidden amongst some HUGE trees with even larger tangled roots.  

We took the Downtown Bus to the area where we wanted to start our hike.  

We climbed a serious set of stairs, both concrete and wooden all the way up into the forest.  

There was a glorious view of the mountains, clouds and the fishing boats.  We know for sure we saw Wild Bill’s boat, Cape Caution, and we really think we saw a few others from “Deadliest Catch!!!”  

We had a really wonderful hike through the rainforest, which is so much different from our forests at home.  There was always something neat to look at as we walked.  

We found several really clever hides of geocaches before heading back down into town.  

Before splitting up to cache/shop, we did a multi-cache which included visiting three different totem poles and answering different questions about them in order to fill in the coordinates for the final cache.  That was a fun way to check out some of the town.  Josh went to go find a few more caches while I headed into the shops to browse.  We met just before all aboard to get back on the ship.  We went immediately for food!  We ate at Topsiders Grill right by the pool.  

At 4:00, we all met to have drinks and play Quirkel.  We had dinner at La Cucina, the Italian specialty restaurant.  It was really yummy!

And, our towel art for the night: A frog!

Alaskan Cruise Day 2: At Sea

 We were up pretty early since we are still adjusting to west coast time.  We had breakfast at Garden Café, and then we ran into Larry and Michelle.  Larry and Josh decided to meet up for the 3-on-3 Basketball Tournament.  The four of us sat around the pool reading for a while.  Then the guys got ready for basketball, and I went along to cheer them on!  

 The whole basketball court was netted all around as well as overhead.  It was pretty windy out, but the guys seemed to get into a groove and did pretty well.  Larry and Josh picked up a third guy and won the first game.  

They lost the second game, but they ended up playing a third against the second group of guys.  Mom and Dad had come by and seen them playing, so we decided to all meet for lunch after the game.  

 FINALLY, basketball ended and we all ate at O’Sheehans for lunch.  Larry and I were the most excited about the cheese sticks on the menu--available pretty much any time... :D

 We relaxed and explored the ship more before meeting to play cards and have drinks.  For some of us, that meant a little casino time...

I found these delicious strawberries in our room when I went back to get ready--YUM!

We had a reservation at one of the specialty restaurants, Moderno (Brazilian steakhouse), that night, so then we all left to get ready for dinner.  Dinner was SO yummy!  We were totally stuffed, and then we headed off to see the evening show: a performance by a couple of amazing acrobats.  It was a really fun night!

Our first towel animal: A doggie!

From Pike Place Market to Open Waters!

The first good thing that happened was we had a message from Larry saying he and Michelle HAD arrived in Seattle!  They were messaging us lots last night about their flight being cancelled and which new flight they would be on getting in LATE!  They were lucky enough to have some super nice friends on this west coast end who picked them up and then delivered them to the cruise ship port this morning!  Josh and I went off to do some geocaching around downtown Seattle, but we met back up with Mom and Dad to pack our bags back into another cab and go down to the cruise ship terminal!!!  We had planned to just check our bags to be held, but Norwegian already had their staff ready to accept bags to be taken straight on board!  Score!  That took out one more step for later in the day.  We left our bags and walked the short walk to Pike Place Market.

I LOVE this market!!!  Mom was super excited to see the fish throwing, so we made sure to see that.  We also randomly ran into Larry and Michelle as they were between meeting different sets of friends!  

And, of course, we got a photo in front of the original Starbucks.

We grabbed some small bites to eat, lots of samples, and some fun goodies to take home.   

 This was a lovely photo shot set up for us :)  

Our ship is in the background: The Norwegian Jewel

 We headed back to the ship to get on board!  By the time we checked in, got our on board account set up, took our initial photo, and actually walked onto the ship, it was probably 1:30.  We headed straight to lunch, of course!  We ate at the huge buffet at Garden Café.  We got a great table on the outdoor deck and watched Seattle and people.  

We toured the ship, and there was SO much to see!  The lower levels were mostly staterooms.  Level 6 has Tsars Palace, the casino, several bar areas, great window seats and balcony access to Stardust Theater.  The reception area is on Level 7 and that has the restaurant reservation desk, the Duty Free shop, a lounge with music, the excursion desk, and Stardust Theater (where the nightly shows are).  Level 12 had the pools, library, card room, fitness center, several restaurants, Garden Café, the spa, and the kids’ programs area.  Level 13 had one of our favorite spots: Spinnaker Lounge.  It  was right above the wheelhouse, and there were just walls of windows with all sorts of comfy seats.  The views as we sailed were magnificent.  The only tricky thing was this room was rarely quiet.  There were dance parties, Bingo, and other on-board activities constantly hosted in this room.  But, it was worth tuning out whatever was going on to enjoy the views!  There were also a couple of restaurants, bars, and lounge areas outside.  We also were able to visit The Bridge, which was an enclosed room looking right into the wheelhouse!  There were all kinds of plaques relating to The Jewel.  We could also watch the progress the ship was making en route and check out some nautical tools.  It was really neat!  

We eventually decided to go check our our state rooms.  While we were doing this, we found out there was a mandatory lifeboat drill.  Our room was just a few down from Larry and Michelle’s, so they were at the same area for the drill.  We saw them, and then we all met up for drinks to watch the boat leave the dock.  We hung out, split back up to get ready for dinner, and then we had dinner all together at Tsars Palace, one of the main dining rooms.  There are two main dining rooms on board (Azura is the second).  There is a grill-type restaurant open all the time called O’Sheehans as well as several other snack areas.  It felt so good to collapse in our room with just ourselves to get ready for bed and get excited for our first whole day on board!!!