2009-8-18 Juneau

After a night and full day at sea, we arrived in Juneau bright and early on Tuesday. 

Having been here before, I knew we could fairly inexpensively get to Mendenhall Glacier. With everyone in our group being on somewhat of a budget, I was trying to come up with cheap excursions to do on our own. There were crowds of people waiting for their busses and tours. We caught the shuttle to the downtown area where we bought tickets for the Glacier Express Shuttle for $6/person/each way and were on our way to Mendenhall Glacier.

I knew this was where we would be able to get pretty close to a glacier by land. Even though the day was overcast and dreary, the glacier was still impressive. David made the comment that he now knows were Tidy Bowl comes from!

A fellow cruise critic meet and greeter was here, too, and offered to take a group picture of us. This was after Ken tried to disappear into the bushes behind us. He had stepped back off of the trail and ended up hip deep in bushes. Bruised (physically and mentally), he made it back up ok and was even able to smile for the picture!  Carolyn elected to stay on board the ship---as did Uncle Joe. 

Again, I didn't make it to the visitor's center here at the park, but we did manage to spend a couple hours wandering around outside.

The sign here shows the different hikes and such that can be taken around the area. When Dad and I went here with our excursion, we were taken on an environmental hike into the woodlands.

Just another look back at the glacier.

Another area we spent awhile at was the boardwalk near where the shuttle from Mendenhall picked us up. There are resident bears here that sometime make their appearance. This little guy walked right up to David and stuck it's nose through the 3 foot high (or so) link fence that was along side the walkway. David thought about petting it, then regained his senses.

The salmon were running this time of year. Not sure what kind these guys are, but there were lots of them.

Our ride back on the shuttle was extremely entertaining although I'm not sure the driver meant to be. His stories had poor Carol doubled over in stitches half the time.

Back downtown, David wanted to go up the Mt. Robert's Tramway. He had been told that it was not to be missed. I had done this with Dad, too, but on a much sunnier and warmer day. I knew there was a restaurant up there and hiking trails. We forked out the $28/person and rode the tram. At the top, we did have a snack of nachos and some sodas in the little restaurant. Then came right back down. It wasn't the best of weather to be hiking the trails. The views aren't as impressive as they are on clearer days.

David and ken did make friends with a tree while up there.

Our cruise ship is the one all the way to the left in this picture. Gives a little perspective to the height of this mountain. This picture was taken at the platform where the tram lets you off.

Here's a view of the shopping district near the docks.

A bear even got in a picture I was taking of Ken in Juno.

After some shopping, the 5 of us headed back to the ship. It was a fun day in Juneau. Cold and overcast, but interesting non the less. Soon we would be heading out of the bay like this ship before us.

I can see why Juneau is such a popular port.  It has so much to do and see.

2007 Alaska cruise

2007 Aug. 24-31 (7 nt) Alaska Cruise--Royal Caribbean Vision of the Seas: Juneau, Skagway, Prince Rupert, Tracy Arm

For as long as I can remember, Dad had 2 dream vacations that he wanted to take---one was to go on an Alaska cruise and the other was to go to Ireland. Unfortunately, he never got to do the Ireland trip, but after his first round of chemo, I immediately booked him and me an Alaska cruise. By then he was fighting metastatic prostate cancer and recovered from colon cancer surgery and chemo for colon cancer. By the looks of him, he appeared to be doing well. If he wasn't, he never let on. But within a week of our return, he was in the hospital fighting for his life and on dialysis for blocked kidney tubes due to his prostate cancer. Stints were able to be put into his kidney tubes and he did recover from that, but the cancer treatments were beginning to stop working now. My best friend and great traveling buddy was on his last great vacation with me, but I didn't know it at the time.  I will cherish this dream vacation with my Dad always.

8-24-07 Embarkation day

 

8-25-07 sea day and around the RC Vision of the Seas

8-26-07  Juneau

 

8-27-07 Skagway 

 

8-28-07 Tracy Arm 

 

8-29-07 Prince Rupert 

 

8-30-07 inside passage

 

We woke up back in Seattle and joined the crowds waiting to debark. The parking garage across the street from the port was convenient. We were on the road within an hour and heading back to Oregon. It truely was a spectacular trip.

 

8-26-07  Juneau


After 2 days at sea, we finally came to our first port---Juneau. It is the capital of Alaska and is only accessible by air or sea. The mountains around the town rise to about 4000 feet. It was a really neat city and is almost as large as Rhode Island and Delaware combined.

We did a ship sponsored photo excursion in Juneau. It was expensive (something like $175@), but was really great. We had a small group of about 10 people (a couple people didn't even have cameras which I found pretty amusing! The tour guide did give them a disposable camera to use,though, which I thought was nice of her). Our first stop on the excursion was to Auke Bay where we boarded a relatively small boat and went out in search of wildlife. I was thrilled that we encountered a couple large pods of Orcas. There must have been at least 60 killer whales in the bay.

 I even inadvertantly caught one breaching off in the distance.

 We were told some of the Orcas here are resident ones and others are transient ones.

  I was amazed at how tall some of their dorsal fins are. We were told that the male Orcas can have dorsal fins as tall as 6'.

 We even saw some resident seals hanging out here.

 Coming back into the harbor gave us these puzzle perfect views.

 The next part of our excursion took us to the popular Mendenhall Glacier.Our guide took us on a hike through the wooded area in the park, too. We had the opportunity to take pictures of lots of wild flora on our hike. This excursion was about 5 hours long and we thoroughly enjoyed it.

 Even saw evidence of beaver activity

 and an occasional cascading waterfall.

 Dad checking out a shuttle stop?

 interesting form of lichen?

 some of the many kinds of mushrooms we saw.

 Loved all the wildflowers along the trail, too!

  Eventually we got within view of Mendenhall glacier.  I was surprised how blue the glacier really is! Apparently that from the ice being compacted so much that only the blue light rays are getting in.

 more beaver activity

 more wildflowers.

 even saw a bunch of salmon. 

 When the excursion was over, we still had a couple hours before we had to be back on the ship, so we decided to go up Mount Robert's Tram. 

 The Mount Roberts Tramway is an aerial tramway located right across from the cruise ship docks.  In operation since 1996, the tram makes a six-minute ascent of 3,819-foot Mount Roberts to a height of about 1,800 feet.

 On top of the mountain we were able to wander a trail and see some amazing, expansive views.

 looking down towards our cruise ship

 I believe the cost was about $27@, but it was well worth it, too. At the top was even a little restaurant where we had a very good fish and chips lunch and then we hiked a bit on some of the paths up there.  Even had wild flora up on the top of the mountain.

 one of the views and the tram.

 looking down towards town

 one of the cruise ships on it's way out

 Eventually it was time to board the chip and leave Juneau.

 More great views as we sailed away

 I was really impressed with Juneau and didn't think it could be beat.