Day 5- Juneau
Today was a whale watching/glacier tour excursion. I was totally looking forward to it. This morning though I made sure to go up early and get some darn food. No way was I going to starve to death today.
Looking over the side of the ship Juneau was really pretty but it didn't have the charm of Ketchikan. It looked more like a big city. Although the mountains were beautiful.
We got on the bus that took us to the whale watching boat. The driver was actually pretty darn funny. We boarded and picked our seats and waited for another bus to come and finish filling up our boat. Once everyone was settled in away we went. It took quite a while before we finally saw some whale spouts in the distance. The boat captain drove us (floated us?) over to where they were just in time for us to see it go under. The naturalist a cute emo man told us that they go under but come back up in a few minutes. Well after going in a darn circle for 15 minutes he laughed and said we were going to go find another less shy whale. We never did see that whale again.
The cute emo man started on a lecture and let me tell you something. If you want to turn a cute man into a incredibly handsome man have him start spouting off things that show you how smart he is. Woo wee... ahem.
Anywhoooo.... we finally found some whales and saw quite a few tails. I have some perfect pictures of the water. See my stupid camera has this delay. So when you click the picture of the whale tail it takes it when the tail is under the water. Very frustrating.
They then showed us some seals too. The whole trip took around 3 hours. By then we were kind of burnt out on whales LMAO. We did get one picture of a tail though.
OH! I forgot to mention at one point a whale surfaced about 20 feet from the boat. Almost everyone on our side had a freaking heart attack thinking we were going to be capsized. FUN! Man they are huge.
We all hopped back on the bus and went to the glacier. The bus driver let us out right where there was a little look out over a stream. We walked up and looked down at the salmon that were spawning. What a sight to see. Bright red fish with green heads the size of my calves just swimming in about 7 inches of water. Every once in a while one would woosh the ground with it's tail to release eggs. It was stunning.
That's when we see a tiny white thing go flying by. Then another and yet another. The ranger starts yelling don't feed the fish. Some yahoo was throwing cookies at the salmon. Seriously what is wrong with people!
A little further down the stream there was this huge group of people. So being the nosy person that I am I wanted to know what was up. Of course I am only 5'-2" so I can't see a darn thing. After a bit of shaking and squishing I finally get up to the edge. I look over and there is a momma bear and two cubs. She was brown and one cub was brown, the other was black. They were just sitting there happy as can be munching on a salmon.
YAY!!!! I saw a bear in Alaska
After watching them for a while we walked on down the path towards the glacier. That first sight. Holy cow. That is something I will never forget. This giant beautiful blue wall of ice. Smaller blue iceburgs floating in the lake before the glacier. Incredible.
We walk down to the edge of the lake and are looking at this beautiful blue floating iceberg in front of us when clunk. A huge rock hits it. We were stunned. Seriously someone is throwing rocks at the pretty blue iceberg... Yup same stupid fish feeding yahoo. Seriously dude what is wrong with you. Sheesh.
By then it was time to get back on the bus. It brought us back to Juneau and I started to drag the honey to the Red Dog Saloon. See I watch deadliest catch and the fisherman go in there to have a drink called a Duck fart. I wanted one lol. We didn't get to go on the deadliest catch excursion in Ketchikan due to the fishing excursion so I didn't want to miss this. The problem was every other person on the planet wanted to go in that bar too. We couldn't even get in the door. I was so darn disappointed. But I did move people out of my way, open the door and put both feet right inside that darn bar so I could say I had been there lol.
We walked all over that town and by the time it was time to go back on the ship I no longer had any feet. No really I just had stubs that pretended they were feet.
We got back on board just in time to go to dinner so off we went. By now we are liking all of our table mates. In fact the guy that had a bitchfest that first night was turning into one of our favorites. That table was rolling in laughter as we talked about our day ashore. Each one of my tablemates was a character. They were all beginning to find me amusing since I have no fear of asking for something different. Or ordering two deserts *snort.
After dinner we walked around the shops and had a drink up on the deck. I was pretty careful with my smokes by the way since I had a giant scab in one nostril. At least it was up high enough that I didn't look like I had blown my nose to death.
We were tired and decided to go to bed around 9:30. Hell we were beginning to feel like the old people of our group by this point. Bed at 9:30 geez.
So off we went on our stubs and crawled into bed. I should mention that the seas were so calm now you almost couldn't tell you were on a boat at all.
AND
What in the heck is up with all the mirrors on the boat. Seriously if you are going to eat yourself silly do you really need mirrors in the elevator that show you just how fat you have gotten in 5 days? UGH
Day 6.... Haines
We didn't have an excursion until the evening. We were going on a evening wildlife viewing around 5 so we didn't have to be up early. Felt like the first time in a long time. We went upstairs to the buffet and looked out over Haines.
Where in the heck are we? There was almost nothing there. Everything was spread out and it looked like small town America in a really pretty setting. We decided to go down and walk around for a bit. Maybe see if we could find someone to take us to the eagle park that was suppose to be here.
We ran into two of our tablemates on our way down. They didn't have anything planned for the day and they were exploring too. We decided to go somewhere together. We found a woman selling excursions on the shore privately. The eagle one started at 12 and got back to late for us to get back to our next excursion but she did have one that started in 15 minutes that was going to a lake where eagles were suppose to be. So the four of us decided why not. It was only $40
We hopped on this little rickity bus and away we went. The first thing we ran into was road construction. Felt like home lol. I am not a height person by the way and due to the road construction we ended up inches from the side of a cliff. It was at that point I was wishing I had depends. It was also at this point the woman tour guide tells us that there are no bathrooms for the next 3 hours. Ummm couldn't you say that before we left. And why is it when someone tells you that there are no bathrooms for the next three hours you suddenly feel like you are going to pee your pants?
Driving through Haines was stunning. The water is a milky blue due to glacier run off. We passed this little house with wildlife flags that sat on the inlet. Then we passed a fish weir.
Let me explain this for those who don't know what that is. When the salmon run the fish and game people set up this wier to block off the fish from going through the river except at a certain point about a foot wide. So all the way across the river is this wooden fish net type thing. Minus the middle foot. Now where this foot wide space is there is a man standing looking into the water. He has a clicker in his hand and every time a fish swims through he clicks his little clicker.
This is his job. Counting fish. For hours a day. Seriously there has GOT to be a better way to count fish then this poor man standing there with a freaking clicker in his hand.
We then get to this beautiful lake where the bus driver lets us go walk around in the forest. This is after she shows us fresh bear poop.
"ok people, look this is fresh bear poop, that means the bear is close by, have yourselves some fun walking through those woods by yourselves, see you in a 1/2 hour"
I will admit though the forest was wonderful. Lush and wet and filled with plants. After our half and hour was almost up I ran to the lake, took off my shoes and waded in.
BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
I actually had to look down to see if I still had feet. At this point I look at the honey to make sure he took a picture of me standing in a lake in Alaska and he is gabbing with our tablemate instead.
Ummm honey... picture before my feet freeze please.
When I got out of the lake my feet were bright red LMAO!!! But I did inspire a few more people to wade in that lake. Grab life by the hands people we are in Alaska! We may never be here again!
We hopped back in the bus and started back when we saw a bear walking along the river. The lady in the bus wasn't going to let us out. You could see steam coming from some of the peoples ears. But then the bear walked under a bridge so she let us all out on the bridge to take pictures. Turns out the bear was a juvenile who had a collar on. Pretty skinny little guy. He was walking towards a fisherman who grabbed his fish in one hand and ran up the side of the river and onto the bridge. You should have seen this man standing there with a fish in one hand looking over the bridge. Funny stuff.
After taking pictures for a while we hopped back on the bus and went back to the ship where we had enough time to have lunch before we went on our princess excursion. We joked about how we were going to go on the same excursion and giggled to ourselves how funny that would be.
When we hopped on the bus for our second excursion. Sure enough what happens? We go towards the same exact place the first excursion took us. We laughed until we had tears in our eyes and figured what the hell. We will never be here again time to enjoy ourselves lol.
We actually got to stop at the house with the little wildlife flags on this tour though. We watched seals bobbing up and down in the water. Looked at a eagles nest. Took pictures of a beautiful eagle in a tree.
We drove right to that lake passing the wier. The tour guide told us we would be stopping there on the way back.
When we got to the lake they had two guided tours into the woods. We joined up with one group and away we went. For some reason we always end up in the back of these tours. I guess I like to make sure no one gets left behind. Wierd quirk of mine.
As we are walking along the tour guide is telling us about the plants in the area. "oh these are blueberries, watermellon berries, cloudberries, elderberries... all are edible"
So what are me and the honey doing as we are walking along in the back.. eating berries. Just popping those suckers in our mouths and chewing away. It was about 1/2 way through the walk that I realize we never saw her point to which berries were which because we were in the back. We were just eating random berries in the wilderness. So smart.
At this point we get back in the bus to to the wier. As we are driving down someone stops the bus driver and tells her that a bear has been sighted down the river so we went driving to go find it, bye wier and counting guy.
At the bridge (yes that same bridge) we see a bear walking back towards the wier. We hop out to take a picture of the bear (yes, it was the same bear!) The bear starts walking down the bank of the river and all of us are following along on the road.
Way in the middle of the river (wide as a 4 lane highway) there is this incredible rock. Standing on that rock is a fisherman. Standing on the shore is a bear. Standing on the road is a huge group of camera happy people.
Suddenly the bear stands straight up, puts it's nose in the air and turns to look directly at the fisherman. The fisherman looks at the bear. The bear starts walking towards the fisherman and scrunches down into a little ball on top of the rock. See now this guy is directly in the middle of this river. He has no where to go. The bear starts ambling towards the fisherman and you can see when he realized that this bear wanted him and his fish.
Somewhere around here is where I would have peed my pants and threw my fish at the bear.
The fisherman starts sliding off the rock the whole time eyeballing that bear. The bear would take to steps towards him.. amble a bit... look back at the fisherman and take another two steps.
It was around here that I also began to worry I was about to watch a bear mauling.
The fisherman was finally in the water that reached his chest (he was wearing waders) and the bear turned fully towards him. The guy started yelling and moving his arms around and trying to scare the bear. At first it didn't look like that bear was going go give up but finally it started to go back up the river towards the wier. As we passed the car from the fisherman it's plates said Washington. That guy (who by the way was out of that river and back in his car so fast I almost didn't see it) has one heck of a story when he gets home.
The bear walked all the way back up the river (with us all following him) to the wier where he reached his paw in the water, pulled out a giant fish and ran across the road into the woods.
We all got back into the bus and went back to the boat.
As we headed to the buffet the captain came on with an annoucement. Our ship was broken down, an expert was being flown in to see if the repairs were adaquate and we would be missing Tracy Arm Fjord. CRAP But! The captain says you can go ashore here until midnight.
Remember the first line of this... there was almost nothing here in Haines. So big woop.
Everyone was really disappointed at the news.
Showing posts with label Cruise. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cruise. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Monday, August 3, 2009
Days 2-4
Day 2....
After getting dressed we decided to go up to the buffet for breakfast. The whole time I was so thankful that I hadn't got seasick. The boat was still rocking and rolling pretty darn good. It made it difficult to walk in a straight line and I kept hearing people comment that they had never felt rocking like this before.
Once we got to the buffet and grabbed some breakfast we went looking for a place to sit. Let me tell you wobbling and carrying a tray of food and a cup of coffee is not an easy thing.
We had to walk around several areas that were roped off due to people being sick. Seriously if you feel sea sick maybe the best place for you is not in the front of the ship with the rocking and the smell of food everywhere. There were these roped off areas all over the ship and all you had to do was look around to see green people. Again I said thank you that I didn't get sea sick!
After breakfast we went to the smoking area and just as we sat down BOOM!! CRACK! the whole ship shuddered. The honey and I looked at each other like OMG we just hit something. Of course there were many other people looking at each other the same way. Turns out we hit a giant swell that actually went over the top of the ship.
Think about that.. over the TOP of the front of the ship!! The people in the buffet had a nice view of water rushing down the windows.
We took a lttle more time to explore the ship and noticed that over half of the people on board had these little circles behind their ears. We learned later that it was for sea sickness. We made a game of seeing who could count the most circles on their side.
Today was the first day and we were going to go meet our roll call group at tea at 3:30. I was looking forward to it.
However.... because we hadn't slept the night before we decided to go lay down for a few minutes at 1:30. We didn't wake up until 4:30 so we totally missed the tea.
We got ready for dinner and went down to the dining room. As a table we were more talkative. Turns out that the Al Bundy/Kramer type dude was actually pretty darn nice. Poor guy and his wife both had those circles behind their ears....*snort.. ahem....
What amazed me was two of the couples all ready remembered everyone's names! I am soo bad at that so it amazed me.
And can someone tell me how a dinner can last that long? Over 2 hours! Did I mention they had creme brulie and I ate 2 LMAO!!
After dinner I wanted to go to the casino for a bit. The honey HATES gambling with a passion but he went up for a little while with me. What a small casino. I was really shocked at how little machines there were on board. I guess in my head I was expecting more then 30 machines. It was kind of disappointing since I like to gamble. However I did win $30 during the short time we were there.
We walked down the stairs and found this little area with a piano in it. No one was really there so we plunked ourselves down and looked out the window for a while. Then a piano man showed up. (Larry)
This guy was funny as hell. We laughed and laughed. At one point a kid walked by and Larry says "Where are you going you wretched boy?" The honey and I laughed out loud at that. Larry kept telling people who were walking by. "SIT down!"
There was a large family group and it's members kept showing up. After about 5 of them showing up at odd times Larry stops playing and asks them how many more are coming. They said something I didn't hear and he said "good god are you people mormans?"
The honey and I looked at each other with giant eyes and open mouths and didn't know if we should laugh or be offended for the morman people. We chose to laugh. (sorry morman people!)
There came a point when about 5 woman with walkers decided to walk in front of the piano when Larry was singing. He stops playing, looks at them, says "Good God" and starts playing Chariots of fire. Funny stuff there!
However... it was at this point when we realized that we couldn't leave without getting some kind of a comment. It was late and we were pretty tired. We whispered back and forth for a bit and waited until he just started to sing and ran. LMAO!! Seriously we ran to the elevator that he couldn't see, went down a floor, walked back to our side, went up a floor and totally avoided him. Such cowards aren't we.
Actually we are because we totally did the same thing every time we saw him playing from that point on lol.
After a nice (OMG I AM FROZEN TO DEATH) smoke we went back to the room for the night.
Day 3..... at sea still
Around this day I could see the honey beginning to fidget a bit. He is used to being busy constantly so this relaxing few days at sea were beginning to take it's toll on him.
But!! It was finally sunny and finally the ship stopped rocking so much!
Today we decided to try a few of the activities on board. We started out with a jeopordy game. We met a really nice couple and they joined our team. Again they were older. Turns out this Alaska cruise was mostly older people although they did say there was 300 children and teens on board. We totally sucked at jeopordy by the way lol.
We then went upstairs to watch a movie under the stars... although technically it was a movie under the sun. It was still cold and I noticed peope had these blankets so off I went to grab us two. I brought them back to the chairs and proceeded to unfold them. What in the heck kind of blankets are those anyway. The stupid thing was a 3 foot by 3 foot square. So either your feet were warm and your top was cold or your top was cold and your feet were warm. We made a mental note to grab two blankets each the next time we watched a movie.
When the movie was over I took a look at the honey. oh oh.. Bright red. I looked at myself and I was pretty darn red too. We laughed and turned in the blankets.
Around this time we could see some whale spouts off in the distance. It was kind of cool to see.
We looked at the paper and noticed we had time to play bingo before dinner. So off we went. We purchased the cards and two daubers only to realize when we got in to the bingo lounge we didn't actually need the darn daubers. Live and learn right. We lost at bingo. Seems like we are losing at everything we try on this ship... well except me and the one casino trip.
It was formal night so we went upstairs to go get dressed. I showered first since it takes me longer to get ready. I slipped my dress on to quite a few comments of ummm can you close the top a bit more.... that's a lot of cleavage... Typical but irritating at the same time.
At this point he grabs his suit pants and proceeds to try to put them on. Fail. See for the last three months I have been telling him to try on his suit. The last time he wore it was almost a year ago and he has been out of work for the last 8 months. I don't know about anyone else but when you have 24 hour a day access to a fridge and all the snacks in the house you tend to gain a bit of weight. Well he had never tried them on and now here it was formal night, with me all dressed up and him trying in vein to button those pants. I admit to being disappointed while at the same time highly amused. I knew we had to tell the tablemates we weren't coming so I headed off to the elevator to let them know. Lucky for me I ran into one of the woman at the elevator. I let her know we wouldn't be at dinner so they wouldn't have to wait and went back to the room.
Once there I changed into something more comfy and we headed off to have pizza. I have to admit it felt kind of strange walking around in comfy clothes while everyone else was all spiffy and having their pictures taken. We did have a really good view of the champagne fountain though.
Pizza was excellent even though we did have to wait a bit. By the time we were done it was fairly late and the paper said that the clock would be changed back an hour that evening. So even though we gained an hour we decided to head upstairs to bed. After all tomorrow was Ketchikan and the honey's dream of fishing in Alaska for salmon.
Day 4.... Ketchikan
Woke up super early since we had a fishing excursion and had to be on dock at 7:50 in the morning. We skipped breakfast since there was going to be drinks and a light snack on the boat.
When we reached the dock we looked around at one of the most beautiful places I have seen. Everything was olden style and the mountains were wonderful. We had dressed for Alaska. I had on a teeshirt, turtleneck, sweater and a jacket. Standing on the dock we realized our mistake though. It was all ready 70 degrees! So I ended up stripping off everything but the teeshirt.
We met a man from the boat on the dock as we waited for our excursion people to come get us. He was fully decked out in fishing attire with two fishing poles. You could see by his eyes that he was totally excited to go fishing. The honey chatted with him until they came and got us. We all walked down to the smaller dock and waited for the fishing boats to line up for us.
There were salmon just jumping out of water everywhere. It was incredible.
We got onto the fishing boat and were greeted by the captains dog. A really pretty springer spaniel. There was a group of 6 of us on the boat and we all settled in as we drove... errr floated.... err...sailed??? out into the ocean to start our fishing trip. We filled out fishing licences on the way.
Off the side of the boat we would see whale spouts. Each time one would blow the dog would start barking. The captain told us that he hated whales and could smell their spouts. We saw a few whale tails and some of the most beautiful scenery I have ever seen in my life.
Finally it was time to fish. The captain's wife came out with 6 playing cards and had us each draw one. The honey got the ace so he got to go first and I drew the 3 card.
They set up 4 fishing poles on the back of the boat and started trolling for salmon. When the first pole bent over the honey's eyeballs lit up like Christmas bulbs and he ran to the pole. He grabbed it, yanked it back to hook the fish and WHAM there was no more fish on the line. You could just see his whole body sag in disappointment. However they allowed each of us two times if you miss your fish so when the second pole bent he ran over again. YANK.... no fish. The poor guy was devastated.
The next lady took her turn and pulled in a salmon. Then it was my turn.
Now I have fished in lakes and streams before but never have I been on a fishing boat like this. The pole bent over and everyone started yelling "Fish on" I walked up to the front and thought "ok here is where I make a fool out of myself". I looked at the captain and asked him to hand me the pole. So the captain hooked the fish and handed me the pole.
I had watched the last two people fishing so I tried to copy them by putting the pole on my stomach but I couldn't get the leverage I needed so I put it where my leg connects to my middle. Then I tried to reel in the fish. Ummm hello! Who knew it was so damn hard to reel in a fish. I struggled and struggled to move that little handle around. I pulled and pulled and began to sweat to death. Finally I could see the fish jumping around in the water. I got it to the boat and the captain reached out with the net and grabbed it. It was a freaking MONSTER fish. Everyone started clapping and I turned around to the honey who had this look like UGH on his face.
See we have this thing where when ever we go fishing I tell him I am going to catch the biggest fish.... and normally I do LMAO!!
My fish made the other womans fish look tiny. After the next group of peoples turns went it was finally the honey's time again. He looked like a little boy he was so excited.
FISH ON! He ran to that pole so fast, yanked it back, started to reel it in and Bam the fish got loose. I swear to you that poor guy looked so horrified that I wanted to pat him on the head. Here we were in Alaska on his dream and he was the only one who hadn't caught a fish.
At the next fish on shout you could see it in his eyes that he wanted that fish bad. He yanked and started reeling it in. You could see it off the boat and everyone was cheering. I had my fingers crossed that it wouldn't fall off and SUCESS!!!! He caught his first Alaskan salmon. A nice beautiful small salmon. Did I mention small? But he did it! He was living his dream and I couldn't be happier for him.
We each caught about 4 more fish and after each fish everyone would check the catch. I still had the biggest fish. The honey was jazzed with the sizes of his fish but he really wanted that bigger fish then me. On the second to the last fish (we were each allowed 6) He finally hooked one that made him struggle a bit. He reeled and reeled and I could see him break out into a sweat. That fish was jumping and pulling and the honey was grinning from ear to ear.
When it finally got close enough for the captain to net I grabbed the camera and waited for his catch to come up. It was HUGE! He actually laughed out loud turned around and gave me a high five he was so excited about his fish. Of course I pretended to be so disappointed that he had the biggest fish when in reality you know I was so happy for him. His dream not mine. He needed that biggest fish.
I missed my next fish so when it was down to the last few people who needed the last fish I let him take my turn.
After we caught 6 fish apiece we were done for the day. About now it was 1:00. We were starving. We went inside to see what kind of "light snacks" were provided.
Guess what they were.
Tootsie rolls. Yup the light snack after a day of fishing with no breakfast was a basket filled with tootsie rolls. You could see the bear coming out of everyone due to hunger.
When we got back on dock we wanted to go into the shops before we went back on the ship to eat. We only had a limited time in Ketchikan and wanted to buy something. I bought a wonderful pink jacket for only $20! This was a steal for me since I don't own a jacket.
After that we ran back to the ship and had lunch. I swear to you I cannot remember being that hungry in a long time.
After eating we went up to the top deck and I had a smoke. During this time a giant blast of wind happened and blew the cherry off my smoke and into my nose. No seriously it did. Something like that would probably never happen again in a million years.
So there I am smashing my nose with my hand trying to make the ember go out while burning the crap out of the inside of my nose. My eyes are watering. All I smell is burned hair and on top of that I shocked myself into a coughing fit. Needless to say I had a big owie in my nose.
Stupid!
We wandered around for a while and looked at the art. Some of that stuff is UGLY!! There were a few good pieces though. Not anything that I would buy but it was fun to look at.
We got ready for dinner and this time the table was super animated. We all talked about our days and had a really great time. I had some really nasty food that I sent back and traded in for something different but dinner was so much fun. And I was finally beginning to remember names.
When dinner was over we went back to the cabin and I grabbed a bottle of desert wine I had brought on board. The honey got a few beers and I drank my wine while we sat on the upstairs deck. We were both totally beat from the fishing and the day. After we finished drinking we went back to the cabin to get ready for bed.
It was at this point that I saw it for the first time. A huge bruise the size of a grapefruit on my leg where I was holding the fishing pole. It was bright red and purple. It is a darn good thing I didn't bring a swimsuit because that thing was UGLY!!
After getting dressed we decided to go up to the buffet for breakfast. The whole time I was so thankful that I hadn't got seasick. The boat was still rocking and rolling pretty darn good. It made it difficult to walk in a straight line and I kept hearing people comment that they had never felt rocking like this before.
Once we got to the buffet and grabbed some breakfast we went looking for a place to sit. Let me tell you wobbling and carrying a tray of food and a cup of coffee is not an easy thing.
We had to walk around several areas that were roped off due to people being sick. Seriously if you feel sea sick maybe the best place for you is not in the front of the ship with the rocking and the smell of food everywhere. There were these roped off areas all over the ship and all you had to do was look around to see green people. Again I said thank you that I didn't get sea sick!
After breakfast we went to the smoking area and just as we sat down BOOM!! CRACK! the whole ship shuddered. The honey and I looked at each other like OMG we just hit something. Of course there were many other people looking at each other the same way. Turns out we hit a giant swell that actually went over the top of the ship.
Think about that.. over the TOP of the front of the ship!! The people in the buffet had a nice view of water rushing down the windows.
We took a lttle more time to explore the ship and noticed that over half of the people on board had these little circles behind their ears. We learned later that it was for sea sickness. We made a game of seeing who could count the most circles on their side.
Today was the first day and we were going to go meet our roll call group at tea at 3:30. I was looking forward to it.
However.... because we hadn't slept the night before we decided to go lay down for a few minutes at 1:30. We didn't wake up until 4:30 so we totally missed the tea.
We got ready for dinner and went down to the dining room. As a table we were more talkative. Turns out that the Al Bundy/Kramer type dude was actually pretty darn nice. Poor guy and his wife both had those circles behind their ears....*snort.. ahem....
What amazed me was two of the couples all ready remembered everyone's names! I am soo bad at that so it amazed me.
And can someone tell me how a dinner can last that long? Over 2 hours! Did I mention they had creme brulie and I ate 2 LMAO!!
After dinner I wanted to go to the casino for a bit. The honey HATES gambling with a passion but he went up for a little while with me. What a small casino. I was really shocked at how little machines there were on board. I guess in my head I was expecting more then 30 machines. It was kind of disappointing since I like to gamble. However I did win $30 during the short time we were there.
We walked down the stairs and found this little area with a piano in it. No one was really there so we plunked ourselves down and looked out the window for a while. Then a piano man showed up. (Larry)
This guy was funny as hell. We laughed and laughed. At one point a kid walked by and Larry says "Where are you going you wretched boy?" The honey and I laughed out loud at that. Larry kept telling people who were walking by. "SIT down!"
There was a large family group and it's members kept showing up. After about 5 of them showing up at odd times Larry stops playing and asks them how many more are coming. They said something I didn't hear and he said "good god are you people mormans?"
The honey and I looked at each other with giant eyes and open mouths and didn't know if we should laugh or be offended for the morman people. We chose to laugh. (sorry morman people!)
There came a point when about 5 woman with walkers decided to walk in front of the piano when Larry was singing. He stops playing, looks at them, says "Good God" and starts playing Chariots of fire. Funny stuff there!
However... it was at this point when we realized that we couldn't leave without getting some kind of a comment. It was late and we were pretty tired. We whispered back and forth for a bit and waited until he just started to sing and ran. LMAO!! Seriously we ran to the elevator that he couldn't see, went down a floor, walked back to our side, went up a floor and totally avoided him. Such cowards aren't we.
Actually we are because we totally did the same thing every time we saw him playing from that point on lol.
After a nice (OMG I AM FROZEN TO DEATH) smoke we went back to the room for the night.
Day 3..... at sea still
Around this day I could see the honey beginning to fidget a bit. He is used to being busy constantly so this relaxing few days at sea were beginning to take it's toll on him.
But!! It was finally sunny and finally the ship stopped rocking so much!
Today we decided to try a few of the activities on board. We started out with a jeopordy game. We met a really nice couple and they joined our team. Again they were older. Turns out this Alaska cruise was mostly older people although they did say there was 300 children and teens on board. We totally sucked at jeopordy by the way lol.
We then went upstairs to watch a movie under the stars... although technically it was a movie under the sun. It was still cold and I noticed peope had these blankets so off I went to grab us two. I brought them back to the chairs and proceeded to unfold them. What in the heck kind of blankets are those anyway. The stupid thing was a 3 foot by 3 foot square. So either your feet were warm and your top was cold or your top was cold and your feet were warm. We made a mental note to grab two blankets each the next time we watched a movie.
When the movie was over I took a look at the honey. oh oh.. Bright red. I looked at myself and I was pretty darn red too. We laughed and turned in the blankets.
Around this time we could see some whale spouts off in the distance. It was kind of cool to see.
We looked at the paper and noticed we had time to play bingo before dinner. So off we went. We purchased the cards and two daubers only to realize when we got in to the bingo lounge we didn't actually need the darn daubers. Live and learn right. We lost at bingo. Seems like we are losing at everything we try on this ship... well except me and the one casino trip.
It was formal night so we went upstairs to go get dressed. I showered first since it takes me longer to get ready. I slipped my dress on to quite a few comments of ummm can you close the top a bit more.... that's a lot of cleavage... Typical but irritating at the same time.
At this point he grabs his suit pants and proceeds to try to put them on. Fail. See for the last three months I have been telling him to try on his suit. The last time he wore it was almost a year ago and he has been out of work for the last 8 months. I don't know about anyone else but when you have 24 hour a day access to a fridge and all the snacks in the house you tend to gain a bit of weight. Well he had never tried them on and now here it was formal night, with me all dressed up and him trying in vein to button those pants. I admit to being disappointed while at the same time highly amused. I knew we had to tell the tablemates we weren't coming so I headed off to the elevator to let them know. Lucky for me I ran into one of the woman at the elevator. I let her know we wouldn't be at dinner so they wouldn't have to wait and went back to the room.
Once there I changed into something more comfy and we headed off to have pizza. I have to admit it felt kind of strange walking around in comfy clothes while everyone else was all spiffy and having their pictures taken. We did have a really good view of the champagne fountain though.
Pizza was excellent even though we did have to wait a bit. By the time we were done it was fairly late and the paper said that the clock would be changed back an hour that evening. So even though we gained an hour we decided to head upstairs to bed. After all tomorrow was Ketchikan and the honey's dream of fishing in Alaska for salmon.
Day 4.... Ketchikan
Woke up super early since we had a fishing excursion and had to be on dock at 7:50 in the morning. We skipped breakfast since there was going to be drinks and a light snack on the boat.
When we reached the dock we looked around at one of the most beautiful places I have seen. Everything was olden style and the mountains were wonderful. We had dressed for Alaska. I had on a teeshirt, turtleneck, sweater and a jacket. Standing on the dock we realized our mistake though. It was all ready 70 degrees! So I ended up stripping off everything but the teeshirt.
We met a man from the boat on the dock as we waited for our excursion people to come get us. He was fully decked out in fishing attire with two fishing poles. You could see by his eyes that he was totally excited to go fishing. The honey chatted with him until they came and got us. We all walked down to the smaller dock and waited for the fishing boats to line up for us.
There were salmon just jumping out of water everywhere. It was incredible.
We got onto the fishing boat and were greeted by the captains dog. A really pretty springer spaniel. There was a group of 6 of us on the boat and we all settled in as we drove... errr floated.... err...sailed??? out into the ocean to start our fishing trip. We filled out fishing licences on the way.
Off the side of the boat we would see whale spouts. Each time one would blow the dog would start barking. The captain told us that he hated whales and could smell their spouts. We saw a few whale tails and some of the most beautiful scenery I have ever seen in my life.
Finally it was time to fish. The captain's wife came out with 6 playing cards and had us each draw one. The honey got the ace so he got to go first and I drew the 3 card.
They set up 4 fishing poles on the back of the boat and started trolling for salmon. When the first pole bent over the honey's eyeballs lit up like Christmas bulbs and he ran to the pole. He grabbed it, yanked it back to hook the fish and WHAM there was no more fish on the line. You could just see his whole body sag in disappointment. However they allowed each of us two times if you miss your fish so when the second pole bent he ran over again. YANK.... no fish. The poor guy was devastated.
The next lady took her turn and pulled in a salmon. Then it was my turn.
Now I have fished in lakes and streams before but never have I been on a fishing boat like this. The pole bent over and everyone started yelling "Fish on" I walked up to the front and thought "ok here is where I make a fool out of myself". I looked at the captain and asked him to hand me the pole. So the captain hooked the fish and handed me the pole.
I had watched the last two people fishing so I tried to copy them by putting the pole on my stomach but I couldn't get the leverage I needed so I put it where my leg connects to my middle. Then I tried to reel in the fish. Ummm hello! Who knew it was so damn hard to reel in a fish. I struggled and struggled to move that little handle around. I pulled and pulled and began to sweat to death. Finally I could see the fish jumping around in the water. I got it to the boat and the captain reached out with the net and grabbed it. It was a freaking MONSTER fish. Everyone started clapping and I turned around to the honey who had this look like UGH on his face.
See we have this thing where when ever we go fishing I tell him I am going to catch the biggest fish.... and normally I do LMAO!!
My fish made the other womans fish look tiny. After the next group of peoples turns went it was finally the honey's time again. He looked like a little boy he was so excited.
FISH ON! He ran to that pole so fast, yanked it back, started to reel it in and Bam the fish got loose. I swear to you that poor guy looked so horrified that I wanted to pat him on the head. Here we were in Alaska on his dream and he was the only one who hadn't caught a fish.
At the next fish on shout you could see it in his eyes that he wanted that fish bad. He yanked and started reeling it in. You could see it off the boat and everyone was cheering. I had my fingers crossed that it wouldn't fall off and SUCESS!!!! He caught his first Alaskan salmon. A nice beautiful small salmon. Did I mention small? But he did it! He was living his dream and I couldn't be happier for him.
We each caught about 4 more fish and after each fish everyone would check the catch. I still had the biggest fish. The honey was jazzed with the sizes of his fish but he really wanted that bigger fish then me. On the second to the last fish (we were each allowed 6) He finally hooked one that made him struggle a bit. He reeled and reeled and I could see him break out into a sweat. That fish was jumping and pulling and the honey was grinning from ear to ear.
When it finally got close enough for the captain to net I grabbed the camera and waited for his catch to come up. It was HUGE! He actually laughed out loud turned around and gave me a high five he was so excited about his fish. Of course I pretended to be so disappointed that he had the biggest fish when in reality you know I was so happy for him. His dream not mine. He needed that biggest fish.
I missed my next fish so when it was down to the last few people who needed the last fish I let him take my turn.
After we caught 6 fish apiece we were done for the day. About now it was 1:00. We were starving. We went inside to see what kind of "light snacks" were provided.
Guess what they were.
Tootsie rolls. Yup the light snack after a day of fishing with no breakfast was a basket filled with tootsie rolls. You could see the bear coming out of everyone due to hunger.
When we got back on dock we wanted to go into the shops before we went back on the ship to eat. We only had a limited time in Ketchikan and wanted to buy something. I bought a wonderful pink jacket for only $20! This was a steal for me since I don't own a jacket.
After that we ran back to the ship and had lunch. I swear to you I cannot remember being that hungry in a long time.
After eating we went up to the top deck and I had a smoke. During this time a giant blast of wind happened and blew the cherry off my smoke and into my nose. No seriously it did. Something like that would probably never happen again in a million years.
So there I am smashing my nose with my hand trying to make the ember go out while burning the crap out of the inside of my nose. My eyes are watering. All I smell is burned hair and on top of that I shocked myself into a coughing fit. Needless to say I had a big owie in my nose.
Stupid!
We wandered around for a while and looked at the art. Some of that stuff is UGLY!! There were a few good pieces though. Not anything that I would buy but it was fun to look at.
We got ready for dinner and this time the table was super animated. We all talked about our days and had a really great time. I had some really nasty food that I sent back and traded in for something different but dinner was so much fun. And I was finally beginning to remember names.
When dinner was over we went back to the cabin and I grabbed a bottle of desert wine I had brought on board. The honey got a few beers and I drank my wine while we sat on the upstairs deck. We were both totally beat from the fishing and the day. After we finished drinking we went back to the cabin to get ready for bed.
It was at this point that I saw it for the first time. A huge bruise the size of a grapefruit on my leg where I was holding the fishing pole. It was bright red and purple. It is a darn good thing I didn't bring a swimsuit because that thing was UGLY!!
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Hi Honey I'm Home!!
I thought I would update you all about my cruise to Alaska. Might take a few days lol.
Day one.....
After a drive from hell through San Francisco we finally saw the ship in the distance. We pulled up to the front of the pier and it was HURRY UP QUICK Move the suitcase run UGH... Bye Saz.....Sheesh. Poor Saz.
We dropped our carry on's off and went up and had a quick lunch. We grabbed our camera from the room and went to the top deck where we waited to shove off and go under the golden gate bridge. As soon as the ship started to move I grabbed myself a HUGE pina colada and settled myself on the railing to watch Alcatraz go by. A picture dude came by and took our picture with Alcatraz in the background. It was totally freezing to death as I stood there with my foo foo drink.
As we got to the bridge people were standing on it waving goodbye to us. You should have seen the ship full of people waving back to the people on the bridge. It was fun. In the back ground a band was playing happy music and people were dancing. Did I mention that I was freezing to death?
As we passed under the bridge the ship honked it's horn. Its incredibly loud OMG I almost peed my pants loud. I laughed my ass off.
We went back to the room and put all of our 5 bags of luggage (plus 2 carry ons) away. We then went exploring for a while. Very pretty ship.
At 5 we went back to the room to get ready for dinner at 5:30. We sat down at our table and waited to see who would join us. We had requested a table for 4 but got one for 10. The first couple was this little tiny full of life older couple Ruth and Joe. The second couple was very quiet and didn't seem to happy. (Joanne and Tom) The third couple was another older couple (heck they were all in their 60's or 70's. (Kathleen and Ed) The last couple was a very pretty woman who walked up with a combo Kramer/Al Bundy man. He was completely pissed off that he did not have a table for 6 and stormed off to give the waiter a piece of his mind. (Al and Barbara) Mr. hello and I looked at each other and thought oh great.
As we sat there the boat started to rock and roll a bit. I could feel my head swim every time it moved up or down. I was super worried that I was going to end up sea sick it was moving so bad. Another lady (al bundy/kramer's wife Barbara) and I kept looking at each other like UGH.
I decided on this trip I was going to try all new things to eat regardless of if it sounded like something I liked or not. After all I could send it back if I wanted to so why not!
After dinner we walked around a bit more and I located the smoking areas. By this time the ship was really moving wierdly making my head feel really bizarre and I wanted to go lay down. (around 9:30)
After taking showers in our tiny tiny little room (and yes it was tiny!) we got into bed. Wait I forgot to mention by this point I had to hold myself up in the shower we were moving so much. And I was totally terrified that this was normal for a boat.
When we laid down you could literally see our feet go up above our head and then our head go above our feet. Over and Over and OVER again. I figured this would be the test to see if I got sea sick or not.
Around 2am the boat started rocking worse and we woke up. Side to Side, Up and down, Roll roll roll. We were not able to sleep. But I didn't get sea sick!!!
Day one.....
After a drive from hell through San Francisco we finally saw the ship in the distance. We pulled up to the front of the pier and it was HURRY UP QUICK Move the suitcase run UGH... Bye Saz.....Sheesh. Poor Saz.
We dropped our carry on's off and went up and had a quick lunch. We grabbed our camera from the room and went to the top deck where we waited to shove off and go under the golden gate bridge. As soon as the ship started to move I grabbed myself a HUGE pina colada and settled myself on the railing to watch Alcatraz go by. A picture dude came by and took our picture with Alcatraz in the background. It was totally freezing to death as I stood there with my foo foo drink.
As we got to the bridge people were standing on it waving goodbye to us. You should have seen the ship full of people waving back to the people on the bridge. It was fun. In the back ground a band was playing happy music and people were dancing. Did I mention that I was freezing to death?
As we passed under the bridge the ship honked it's horn. Its incredibly loud OMG I almost peed my pants loud. I laughed my ass off.
We went back to the room and put all of our 5 bags of luggage (plus 2 carry ons) away. We then went exploring for a while. Very pretty ship.
At 5 we went back to the room to get ready for dinner at 5:30. We sat down at our table and waited to see who would join us. We had requested a table for 4 but got one for 10. The first couple was this little tiny full of life older couple Ruth and Joe. The second couple was very quiet and didn't seem to happy. (Joanne and Tom) The third couple was another older couple (heck they were all in their 60's or 70's. (Kathleen and Ed) The last couple was a very pretty woman who walked up with a combo Kramer/Al Bundy man. He was completely pissed off that he did not have a table for 6 and stormed off to give the waiter a piece of his mind. (Al and Barbara) Mr. hello and I looked at each other and thought oh great.
As we sat there the boat started to rock and roll a bit. I could feel my head swim every time it moved up or down. I was super worried that I was going to end up sea sick it was moving so bad. Another lady (al bundy/kramer's wife Barbara) and I kept looking at each other like UGH.
I decided on this trip I was going to try all new things to eat regardless of if it sounded like something I liked or not. After all I could send it back if I wanted to so why not!
After dinner we walked around a bit more and I located the smoking areas. By this time the ship was really moving wierdly making my head feel really bizarre and I wanted to go lay down. (around 9:30)
After taking showers in our tiny tiny little room (and yes it was tiny!) we got into bed. Wait I forgot to mention by this point I had to hold myself up in the shower we were moving so much. And I was totally terrified that this was normal for a boat.
When we laid down you could literally see our feet go up above our head and then our head go above our feet. Over and Over and OVER again. I figured this would be the test to see if I got sea sick or not.
Around 2am the boat started rocking worse and we woke up. Side to Side, Up and down, Roll roll roll. We were not able to sleep. But I didn't get sea sick!!!
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