It's all over but the shoutin'

Victoria is our last port. We arrived at about 3:00 pm and departed
just before midnight. Victoria is not very far from Vancouver which is
the end of our trip. Bade agreed to humor me and we did an excursion to
Buchart Gardens. We had about a 45 minute bus ride out to the gardens.
Our bus driver was very informative and took the time to show us many
parts of this picturesque town.

Buchart Gardens was built on a limestone quarry and is about 55 acres.
The gardens were absolutely fantastic, very colorful. One of the things
that really impressed me about the gardens was that most of the
landscaping was done with fairly common plants instead of really exotic
specimens. We did take quite a few pictures, actually way more flower
pictures than we will ever need.

On our ride back into town, the driver took us through downtown and
showed us some of the wonderful old buildings. One of these was the
Empress Hotel which was really beautiful. We arrived back at the ship
at about 7:00 pm for our last meal on the ship.

We arrived in Vancouver about 6:00 am. We had arranged to carry off our
own luggage and as such were in the first group to leave the ship. In
our concern to be sure to be able to get on an elevator, we left our
stateroom an hour before we were scheduled to exit the ship. This ended
up being a good thing as many subsequent passengers had trouble getting
in the elevators. We were off the ship by 8:00 am and this would have
been great except we knew we would not be able to check into our hotel
in Vancouver until about noon.

We did choose to walk the 5 or 6 blocks from the cruise terminal to our
hotel. Sure enough it would be noon before we could check into our room
but they let us put our bags in storage. They also arranged for a cab
at 5:30 am tomorrow so we will have ample time to get to the airport for
our 8:45 flight to DFW. We had breakfast, walked around downtown
Vancouver and sat on some of the park benches until time to go to the hotel.

We have now eaten dinner and are back in our room. Hopefully we will
arrive at the airport without difficulties tomorrow and should be back
in SA by about 6:00 pm tomorrow. This has been a wonderful trip but we
both are looking forward to getting home.

See you guys soon.

Bade here ... yep ... the tale is told and the ship has sailed.
Barring any extraordinary travel complications this is likely the last
entry in this web log. I will post additional pictures in the gallery
in the next few days including some of Buchart Gardens.

Thanks for tuning in ... now we return you to our regular programming.

Victoria without a net ... (or wasting the day in Victoriaville)

It's Wednesday so this must be Victoria ... actually we are still about
5 hours out of Victoria hugging the coast of Vancouver Island. We will
dock in Victoria at 3PM ship's time and depart at midnight on our final
leg back into Vancouver.

I'm writing this web log now because we have been advised that about an
hour out of Victoria and then well after midnight we will no longer have
internet access of any kind from the ship. Apparently there is some
sort of military blocking signal that disables the satellite signal ...
maybe Victoria is living in the "netless age" .. don't know but it means
I have to consume the rest of the internet minutes I have paid for
between now and then.

We were awakened this morning about 3AM to the ship's fog horn blaring
away ... looking outside it was obvious why ... I could barely see the
railing on the balcony the fog was so thick ... the ship's horn
continued to blast at 5 minute or so intervals so sleeping was somewhat
sporadic.

Since this is basically the last day of the voyage (we have to be off
the ship by 7:15AM tomorrow) ... Carolyn and I lazed about until almost
8AM skipping our jog/walk routine and simply savoring the last day of
the "Great Alaska Adventure of 2008". We had a nice breakfast,
realizing these were the last fried eggs and bacon we would be seeing
until probably November when we embark on the Mediterranean cruise. We
are both actually very ready to get back home and resume our "normal"
routine. The voyage has been spectacular but 16 days away from home is
just about the longest time we have spent away in many many years (early
IBM schools were the only exception).

In the port of Victoria we have scheduled a tour of the "Butchart
Gardens" .... about 55 acres of floral gardens ... I'll be posting
pictures of that either after we get to our room Thursday in Vancouver
or after we return home.

We have packed up ... decided what we needed to have available in our
backpacks and will walk our bags off ourselves tomorrow morning.

We hope the readers and subscribers to our journey's web log have
enjoyed our descriptions as we sailed along ... we enjoyed writing the
entries and then reading your comments!!

Back in Texas Friday around 6PM if all goes well.

Puffins and Whales and Capt'n Davey ... (or Otters have it all figured out!!)

5:15pm Monday (ship's time) and well underway from Sitka, Alaska.

We just finished our self imposed 30 minutes of track time up on deck 10 and are settling in for a fairly long passage ... our next port is Victoria, Canada day after tomorrow at 3pm local ... so we have basically 2 days at sea to look forward to.

I had booked our Sitka excursion way back in April or May on the suggestion of another cruiser I met online at cruisecritic.com .  She suggested a very small operation named "Puffins and Whales" run by a young fellow named Davey Lubin.  I exchanged emails with Davey and discovered that his boat accommodates only 6 passengers and himself as captain.  This sounded like the kind of excursion  Carolyn and I prefer ... small and intimate.  Sitka is the only tender port on our cruise and Davey had suggested we get the first available tender to be sure we could make our 8:30am pickup ... well, telling me to "be early" is tantamount to telling a sled dog to run ... it really isn't necessary but we appreciate the encouragement. So ... Carolyn and I were the first passengers down to deck 3 when the tenders started running ... turns out ... we were the ONLY passengers down at the tenders when they started so we got our own private tender (they probably hold 50+ passengers) into the beautiful port of Sitka.  We arrived about 8am.

Capt'n Davey showed up about 8:15am and suggested we walk with him to get coffee ... as we strolled along we had a pleasant chat, exchanged family details and got to know each other a bit.  Davey has worked as among other things a deck hand on commercial fishing boats, a commercial diver, was educated in Idaho and nowadays spends his working like providing water taxi service around Sitka sound (there are many many small islands here) and the wildlife tours like ours.  He has an expansive knowledge of the local wildlife with an emphasis on water fowl and large sea mammals.  We ambled back to the dock and met the four other passengers booked on our 4 hour excursion  ... a grandmother and 3 granddaughters aged 11,13 and 15.  We boarded the "Ester G II" (named for Davey's grandmother) and off we went in search of wildlife of all kinds.

The Sitka sound body of water is very large and surrounds many small islands including the island of Sitka itself.  Today the water was like glass ... barely a ripple as far as one could see.  Davey was amazed at the sea conditions and said typically we would be experiencing 4-6 ft seas rather than the bathtub like water we had today.  The calm water made it fairly easy to both see and hear whenever a humpback whale would "blow" at the surface and gave us ample opportunity to locate and motor towards the creature as it would breach the surface 3 or 4 times before finally "showing tail" and diving deep  for several minutes.  We got several good pictures of these enormous animals as they fed on krill in the 450+ ft deep water.  It is hard to describe what it is like to be literally yards from one of these graceful behemoths in placid seas as they break the surface in a gentle swell of grey and see the geyser of water climb in the air knowing that shortly you will be rewarded with two incredible flukes waving to you as the creature dives deep to sweep thousands of krill into its mouth.  It is breathtaking.

After watching several whales and with a promise to return on our way back in Davey took us to St. Lazarious island.  This island is among many that are part of the federal game preserve in the area (there is a more official sounding name than game preserve but I can't recall that at the moment).  I can say without equivocation this is one of the most beautiful places I ever hope to see ... it has a raw and unscathed beauty one would expect to see in a pre-historic era.  There are spruce trees high above the water line, grasses flowing down the rocky cliffs, thousands of various water birds nesting in the vertical rock faces, star fish and anemones all along the waters edge and brilliant colors due to coral and sponges just at and below the waterline.  We have pictures to be posted because words cannot describe the absolute beauty of this very special place.  We spent a good bit of time slowly circling this 65 acre island just observing the interaction between the sea and the avian inhabitants.  There were hundreds of puffins, murres and auklets ... all water fowl of the area.

As we headed back towards Sitka we stopped at another small island to observe several harbor seals lounging on the rocks and swimming in the icy water... all very unconcerned about the tourists snapping pictures and pointing excitedly.

Of all the creatures we saw today I have to say that my personal favorites are the Sea Otters.  The Whales are magnificant, the Puffins are beautiful and the Seals are comical ... but to my mind the Otter has the perfect attitude.  We regularly saw several of these animals laying out on their backs, heads either resting on their chests or poking up observing their current situation basically thumbing their noses at the rest of the world.  The expression on their face is one of absolute disinterest ... basically they have staked out their patch of ocean for the current while and life is more than welcome to pass them by ... they simply don't seem to care.  A couple of times we would see one eating (still on its back and chomping away on whatever it had snagged for lunch) casting an unconcerned eye to the boat and crazy people snapping pictures of what it does every day .. all day .. as if to say ..."what's the big deal?? Nothing to see here ... nothing to see at all ..."  ... I am fascinated by these critters.

All to soon our four hours were up and Capt'n Davey dropped us off at the pier making a quick turn around to pick up his next 6 very lucky guests.

Finally a short note about Sitka ... the village of Sitka has approx 8,500 citizens all living on a spectacular piece of this planet that is almost unspoiled ... they have purposefully NOT built a large dock that can accommodate cruise ships because collectively the town does not want to turn into another "Skagway" where tourists out number the citizens almost every day during the summer.  The town itself looks very much like you might picture a small, quaint fishing village.  As we walked to get coffee with Davey it was clear the citizens know one another and genuinely care for each other ... they support each other by promoting local business over the "national chains" and seem very protective of the environment they are fortunate enough to call home.


Carolyn here - This has been an absolutely awesome trip.  We have had some thrilling adventure excursions,  seen unbelievable unspoiled scenery, and have been fortunate enough to view some of the really special creatures that call this part of the world home.  Of all the port calls we have made, Sitka was my favorite.  We may have had more excitement on some of our other excursions but the town itself is truly unique.  It reminds me of the fictional town of Cecily, Alaska on the TV show "Northern Exposure".  Everybody seems to know everybody else and the citizens seem to have a mutual goal - show the tourists a little glimpse of the last frontier that is Alaska but don't make it too convenient.  I have a hope of someday returning to Sitka, spend a week or so, and get to explore this wonderful little community.  Something to dream about in the future. 

In the mean time - on to Victoria and then shortly back to Texas.

Juneau - What to do? What to do? Soooo - you're afraid of heights!!!!

We arrived in Juneau this morning to another beautiful day, just like Kodiak.  In other words, cool, cloudy and foggy.  I am really glad we did not have some kind of flying excursion planned. 

We had planned to walk this morning on the upper deck but as Bade's back was still bothering him, we opted out of the morning exercise.  Decided we better save up for the adventure ahead.

We departed the ship at 8:30 to meet up with the rest of our fellow passengers to partake in the Alaska Canopy and Rain forest Excursion.  Now, if you don't know what a canopy excursion is, it is a zipline adventure.  Wooden platforms are placed varying distances apart up in the trees.  Steel cables are strung from one platform to another at heights between 45 and 180 feet above the ground.  The distances between the platforms ranged from about 150 feet to about 700 feet. 

There were only four hardy souls in our little group of adventurers.  Bade, me, Ray (who had been on the whitewater rafting trip with us), and Paul.  Paul was the only member of our group who had not done a zipline trip before.  We took a short 10 minute boat ride over to the little island where the zipline course is.  Arriving at the base of the zipline course, we were fitted with the equipment that would be used to attach us to the steel cable.

After a short hike, we arrive with our guides, Zippy and Dan and were given an excellent orientation.  We were given instructions on how to keep going straight on the zipline, how to brake, and what to do if we braked to quickly and did not make it to the next platform.  We then did a little short practice run to make sure we were comfortable with the equipment.  Zippy always went first, would then get situated at the next platform to prepare for either catching us, if we didn't slow down enough, or helping us get to the platform if we stopped too soon.  As luck would have it, I was the first to try the practice run - oh yeah, did I mention, I'm afraid of heights??  Now I know this doesn't make sense that I would agree to jump off into the air, attached by a harness to a steel cable and speed through the tree tops at as much as 35 miles per hour,  when I am afraid of heights.   But for some reason,  because I am attached to this cable, it doesn't seem to bother me all that much.  Maybe it's because I am so focused on looking ahead to make sure Zippy is going to catch me, that I don't look down at the ground.  We all successfully managed the practice run and we are ready for the "big league". 

In all, there were 9 ziplines covering approximately 6000 feet.  Also included in this adventure were two suspended wooden bridges that we had to walk across.  This, for me, was the most unnerving part of this excursion.  I think that's because I had to look down to see where I was walking and realized that I really was 100 or so feet up in the air.  The bridges are really not that bad in that we are attached to the steel cables and there are ropes on each side of the bridge to aid us in walking over the bridges.  On the second bridge, Zippy decided it would be fun to jump up and down to make the bridge really move around a lot.  I reminded him that his tip was getting smaller and smaller by the minute and he assured me that a big gust of wind had caused the bridge to swing back and forth.  RIGHT.

All to soon, our adventure was coming to an end.  There was one last challenge.  We were to repel 45 feet from the last platform to the ground.  While this had also been a concern for me,  along with the bridges, it ended up being really easy and fun.  This excursion was a lot of fun and I will certainly look forward to more zipline adventures when the occasion arises in the future.

We did get to do a little shopping on the way back to the ship.  We have found many really wonderful Alaskan made totems, carvings and woven goods.  Unfortunately, like everything else in Alaska, they have proven to be very expensive.  I was lucky enough to find a needlework store and bought a couple of counted cross stitch patterns that will have to serve as our souvenirs of our Alaska cruise instead of the pottery I normally try to get.

We returned to the ship and were treated to a presentation by Libby Riddles.  She was the first woman to win the Iditarod dog sled race.  When I was here nine years ago with my Dad, she happened to be the dog musher when I did my dog sled excursion.  She gave a wonderful talk and did a powerpoint presentation on her preparation and running of the Iditarod race.

We had a really wonderful and fun day.  We are on to Sitka, the next to last port on our trip.  I can't believe that our trip is almost over.  While I will be glad to get home, this has been a fabulous trip.  In Sitka, we have a private boat trip planned for whale watching so hopefully, we will have some really awesome whale and wildlife pictures tomorrow.  Bade will be posting a few pictures from our zipline trip.

Later,  Carolyn


Bade here ... Carolyn covered the day very well ... the zipline adventure was really pretty cool ... somehow I never thought about a rain forest being in Alaska ... but during our visit it was raining and it is a forest ... so I guess by definition if nothing else.  Actually we didn't do the 6am jog/walk because I was really sleeping ... my back in fact is much better and was no problem on the zipline.

Obviously we didn't post anything yesterday ... it was basically a dreary foggy day at sea with only a couple of whale sightings right before dinner (formal night) and thankfully calm seas as we crossed the Gulf of Alaska from Kodiak to Juneau.  I think sea days are scattered in these itineraries to give one some down time to recover from the last adventure and gear up for the next.  As Carolyn mentioned the cruise has slipped by very fast so far ... we are looking forward to being home of course but it's been an amazing adventure.

Sitka tomorrow to see Puffins and Whales ... HOPEFULLY lottsa whales ... I am only posting a few pics from today's adventure ... it's hard to manage a camera while zipping along at 35mph at 100+ feet in the air seeing a giant tree coming at you head on and knowing the poor fellow waiting to catch you on the next platform weighs120lbs soaking wet ...

No air ... No bear ..... (it's a foggy mountain breakdown ...)

Always ... ALWAYS ... have a plan "B" ... sadly for this day there was
no plan "B".

I awoke about 4am expecting to see the typical early morning dawn light
filter through the drawn shades of our balcony window ... oddly ...
there was barely any light at all ... remember dawn comes very very
early here and sunset is around 11pm. This did not bode well for our
Kodiak bear watching adventure. Back to sleep ...

At 6am ... I walked out on the balcony after being awakened by several
loud and insistent blasts of a ship's horn .. OUR ship in fact ... I was
greeted with a scene out of the "Hounds of the Baskervilles" ... a
dreary morn on the Scottish moor ... fog so thick I could barely see the
ship's bow. Once we were docked ... I could just barely make out the
green mountains alongside but only a few hundred feet up; their upper
halves (or more) shrouded in thick billowing fog.

Knowing things did not look promising we ate a quick breakfast, again
looking at the foggy scene from the dining room and then disembarked for
our 8am-8:15am pickup by Kingfisher air service. 8:15am rolled around
with no "silver van with a red stripe and the name Kingfisher air" in
sight. So I called them ... said I was at the dock waiting for pickup
... they responded with .."we could pick you up but we likely won't be
flying today ..." --- RATS!!! ... we agreed to wait another 30 minutes
to see if the fog would lift (it wasn't likely) and make contact again
... back on the ship ... after 30 minutes I called again ... nope ...
can't fly in this soup ... they offered to take us "flightseeing" if the
fog lifted by noon ... "no thanks ... just came to see the bears".

And thus ends the sad story of our Kodiak bear watching adventure ...

So ... with no real plan B ... we decided to see what the town of Kodiak
City had to offer. The ship was running a continuous shuttle from the
dock to mid-town for the princely sum of $6 per round trip. As we
waited for the next shuttle the little lady in the dockside information
booth came out and told us the walk was only about fifteen minutes
"right down that road" ... I think she saw two reasonably healthy adults
NOT in wheelchairs and not using walkers or canes and decided we should
save the $12. So ... off we went "down the road" ... it's appropriate
to mention at this point that the main driving force behind the Kodiak
economy is fishing ... big time commercial fishing ... and as a result
... Kodiak is host to several very large and very odious fish processing
plants ... as it turns out ... that 15 minute stroll from the cruise
ship pier to "downtown Kodiak" takes you right beside virtually ALL of
those fish processing plants ... the trek to town was neither scenic nor
"pleasant" olfactory wise ... turns out FISH STINK!!

Once we made it into downtown Kodiak city we discovered it to be similar
to Valdez ... not really a "tourist" kind of place ... it isn't on many
(if any other) cruise ship's itineraries and thus doesn't really cater
to the "pod people" we have become.

We walked around a bit, went into 2 or 3 shops, visited a local "arts
and crafts fair" (which I suspect was organized solely because there was
a cruise ship in town today) and then walked back to the ship ... past
those same lovely fish processing plants ...

It turns out ... if you can't fly to see bears in Kodiak ... the next
best plan is to do your dirty laundry ... an activity I am engaged in as
I write this sorry tale.

Tomorrow is a sea day as we make the long passage back to Juneau so it
is unlikely there will be much if anything of merit to post tomorrow ...
I've been dealing with a severe back spasm problem since after the white
water rafting trip and hopefully it will abate before the zipline tour
day after tomorrow in Juneau ... I went to see the ship's doctor
thinking I could get some muscle relaxants but it was going to turn into
a bigger ordeal than I wanted to mess with so I'm hoping time, rest and
aleve will come to the rescue.

Time to go check the dryer ....

Bade

A tail of a whale ... (or hitting the trifecta in Alaska)

Today's excursion was the "Resurrection Bay wildlife cruise" out of
Seward booked through the cruise line. "Booking thru the cruise line"
means among other things, "you are NOT alone". In fact, you are a small
part of a large herd. In this particular case our herd was two school
buses and a 25 passenger van strong.

We boarded the buses and were taken all of 3 blocks (large blocks I
grant you but only 3 nonetheless), to the marina in Seward where several
hundred boats of all shapes and sizes are docked. As we rolled along I
was taken with the number of RV's parked in several RV facilities along
the way. A bunch of people come here in the summer as a part of an RV
vacation and it is clear why once you look around. The mountains on all
sides of Seward (meaning on all sides of the fjord at which Seward sits
at the head) are lush with green and capped with snow. Waterfalls
tumble down to the sea on all sides and the water of the fjord (which IS
Resurrection Bay) is teaming with life of all sorts... birds, fish and
mammals.

We boarded our tour vessel the Kania Explorer, found a seat on the upper
outside deck (the boat was approx 80ft long, has an enclosed lower deck
with galley and 4 heads and an upper deck with outside and inside
seating) and were already glad we had worn long johns and multiple
layers ... it's becoming apparent that warm clothes are fairly key when
visiting Alaska during the summer ... I cannot imagine what winter
months must be like here.

Shortly after we began our voyage into the bay the boat captain pointed
out a sea otter basking on his back in the early day sunshine grooming
himself and looking quite please with his situation. He was actually
bigger than I would have guessed these animals get. We slowly motored
around him at a respectful distance and he was unperturbed ... casting a
jaundiced eye at the boat clearly thinking "... damn tourists ... "...

Shortly after leaving the otter to his own devices, the captain
announced on the intercom that he had just been notified of a 45 ton
treat coming up on the port bow ... and ... "thar she blows!!" .. a
mammoth humpback whale was blowing and gracefully breaching the surface
of the otherwise calm water. We only got a couple of pictures of this
creature before it dove deep and vanished but I did catch one "tail
shot" I will post in the gallery ... not the best picture I ever took
but the 1st humpback tail I ever shot.

It wasn't long before the captain again excitedly announced whale siting
... this time a pod of Orca whales (about 7 in this pod). These whales
stayed well within our visual grasp for a long while offering plenty of
photo opportunities. Some of these too I promise to post to the web
gallery.

After getting more than our share of Orca sitings we moved further into
the bay where literally thousands of birds roosted in the rock face
walls. I can't begin to tell you all of the types of birds we saw but
the one of most interest was the Puffins ... two types, "tufted" and
"horned" and both entertaining to watch as they dive up to 300ft for
food. Very colorful heads on these birds, We saw birds that looked
like miniature penguins and thousands of sea gulls many with chicks in
the nest (nest of rock ledge).

Just past these thousands of rock dwelling birds were several "islands
of small rocks" on which dozens of sea lions lounged, slept, and barked
at each other. We were told that sea lions are nocturnal feeders and
used the day to rest on these small islands. The majority were tan to
dark brown. Carolyn got many good photos of these animals.

All too soon the captain turned the boat around to head back to Seward
... but that didn't mean the excitement was over ... shortly after
turning we encountered a small pod of Dahl Porpoise cruising out to sea
... these are very fast and basically gone as soon as they were visible
... so no pictures.

And finally to make the trifecta complete ... the captain announced
siting the rarest of all ... a Minke whale off the starboard side ...
this animal is apparently very shy and rare to see ... he breached the
water several times to our delight but was too far off to catch with our
18x camera.

The waters in this part of Alaska host only 3 species of whale ... and
we saw all of them in our short 3.5 hour tour ... the weather was
splendid with sunshine and calm waters... we had a very good day.

Next up ... Kodiak .. and hopefully some really BIG bears ... let's see
... no bacon, sweetrolls, candy in the pockets ... plenty of deet spray
... yep ... we are ready!!!

Bade

White water rafting in Alaska!!!! Whose idea was this anyway???

We arrived in Valdez at 8:00 am. As we were to depart for our white
water rafting excursion at 8:20 am, we did our walk/jog around the track
on the upper deck at 6:00 am. It was really quite enjoyable even if it
was a bit chilly, 54 degrees.

We had been told to dress warmly for this excursion, to bring extra
socks, and a waterproof camera. Our first dilemma - how warm is
warm? We eventually decided to wear pretty much every piece of warm
clothing we had brought. This turned out being way to much clothing but
were able to leave our heavy coats in the van.

Bade and I and eight other fools met up with the van that was to take us
up the Lowe River to where we would "put in" for our rafting adventure.
In our group were a grandmother with her two 12 or 13 year old
granddaughters, a gentleman about 10 years older than us, a thirty
something couple and a father with his twentyish year old son. Sounds a
little like the S. S. Minnow - hopefully without the same result.

The van ride was about 25 minutes past many beautiful waterfalls. Our
driver got a real thrill out of telling us that we would soon be rafting
down the river right under those same waterfalls.

We arrived at the "put in" location and immediately removed our shoes
and were fitted with dry suits and knee high waders. As none of us had
ever worn a dry suit, this was probably quite entertaining for our
guides as we struggled to get these properly fitted. Basically when we
all were dressed, we looked like distant cousins to the Goodyear man.

We were then given a brief orientation which primarily consisted of what
to do if one of us fell out of the raft. We were each given a paddle,
which I suspect was more for show than actual use. Our guide had two
large oars which he used to steer the raft as we quickly floated down
the river.

We were broken into two groups of five each. Fortunately, our group was
made up of the older gentleman, the thirty something couple and Bade and
me. The other group was the dad with his grown son and grandma and her
two granddaughters. Grandma and the two granddaughters proved pretty
much worthless during the journey down the river but I must give Grandma
credit for making the trip at all.

We started our trip with Bade and Mike (the male half of the young
couple) in the front. I was behind Mike with the older gentleman behind
Bade and Jenny behind me. We hit the first rapid and I found myself
sitting on the bottom of the raft. HUM - this could prove to be very
interesting, and cold and oh yeah WET. At the next rapid, Mike almost
fell in. He saved himself by grabbing a hold of me (like I could help
him). He managed to stay in the raft and spent the next five minutes
apologizing for grabbing a complete stranger. I assured him that there
"ain't no pride when you're trapped inside a slowly sinking ship (or in
this case, a rapidly moving raft).

We did in fact go right under where those waterfalls terminated in the
river and yes most of us got fairly wet. Kudos to Bade and Mike for
taking most of the water and shielding the rest of us from the majority
of the really cold water (approximately 36 degrees). The dry suits kept
us surprisingly toasty with only our hands and heads getting really,
really cold.

After about 30 minutes, we were to the place we would be getting off of
the river. Everybody in our raft was really disappointed - we had just
gotten the hang of paddling and were ready to go another 30 minutes or
so. This trip was a ton of fun and hopefully sometime in the future we
can try white water rafting again. The only disappointments - the trip
was not long enough and we did not have time to take any pictures.
Fortunately, our van driver raced down the mountain ahead of us and
stopped in several places to take pictures of us and hopefully when we
get home we will have a CD of those pictures waiting for us.

The town of Valdez is quite small with no promising shopping
opportunities so we arrived back on the ship in time for lunch. Have
rested this afternoon and are looking forward to arrival in Seward
tomorrow. We have scheduled a cruise of Resurrection Bay on a small
sight seeing boat. Nine years ago when I made this trip with my Dad, I
did this same excursion. We saw whales, seals, porpoises and of course
eagles. I hope to be able to get some good whale pictures tomorrow.
While we saw three different pods of whales from our balcony yesterday,
including a pod of orcas, they were too far away and too fast to get any
decent pictures.

That's all from me for now. Bade will add something shortly.

Carolyn

Bade here ... I have very little to add ... the dry suits are basically
bio-hazard suits without the helmet ... a water seal at the neck and
wrists and footsies like pajamas.

Valdez is an interesting choice for Princess as a port ... no other
cruise ships stop here during the summer ... so the Tahitian Princess is
the only ship ... 8 times over the whole summer ... I can't see this as
a money making stop for Princess.

Onward to Seward and to renew our search for whales and other big animals.

Bade