2016 /Alaska Cruise - Day 8 (Tracy Arm Fjord)

Wow...really nice day today.  We woke up to the boat cruising up into the Alaska territory passing by all the many islands (small and large).  We knew it was going to be a great day.  It is July 28th.

Our day started with a few of us bypassing the buffet for breakfast and going into the dining room.  The experience was much better as the buffet is amazingly crowded on this boat.  The goal was to be done eating and up on deck securing our set of seats to watch for whales and the beautiful scenery as it passed by.  But before we did this, I mentioned to Denise that we were in Alaska waters and maybe it was possible we would get an AT&T signal...and by golly she did!  She then got a bunch of texts telling us that Karlie was in labor back home.  Good and bad news as we're glad she is delivering...but we're sad we're not there.  Anyway...we had a nice skype session with her and Ashley at the hospital and all was going well.

We spent the bulk of day up on deck watching (and seeing) whales as we passed through the waters and up into the Fjord.  At about noon our time, we turned into the Edmonton Fjord and headed to one of the large glaciers.  The passage became much more narrow and the scenery amazingly beautiful with mountains going up from the water with myriads of waterfalls coming down them.  While traveling, Mike shared his wifi account and we were able to Skypeing Ashley while Karlie actually delivered her new born son.  Yes...we were present.  Kind of a minor miracle.  All went well which made us so glad.

We continued our travels up to the huge glacier where we parked the cruise ship for about an hour while people took pictures of it from a far.  Many times the ice 'calved' off big chunks of ice into the waters.  That was really cool to see and hear.  For $200 per person, one could get on a smaller boat and travel even closer to the glacier.  It is kind of interesting to be traveling up these fjords dodging ice in the water!  I wanted to yell 'Ice Berg' the whole time.

As we traveled we did see some moose and few bald eagles along the shore.  Later in the day, we heard that a Brown (Grizzly) Bear was seen.  We never saw it though.

In between seeing the fjord and dinner, Denise and I once again Skyped with Karlie.  We were able to talk with her and see our new grandson.  He looks great...born at 4:10 PM (MDT) weighing 7 lbs, 8 oz's.  He has lots of dark hair...he must have some Mexican blood in him!

Tonight was our 'specialty dinner' night.  We went to the Steak House restaurant on the boat.  Boy was it a feed!  They normally charge $35 per head.  But this was thrown in as part of the cruise.  Very nice food...very fancy...large portions...too much!   Everyone made a big deal about Dale and Julee and how much they mean to each of us.  They are special to all of us.  It was a really nice evening.

Pictures:

The crew hoping to see whales...our position for most of the day until the weather turned foul....

Dale and Julee keeping warm....

My beautiful wife handling the rainy weather...

Approaching the glacier....

Iceberg's along the way....

The glacier....you can see the tour boats in the distance and how small they are in comparison.

2016 Alaska Cruise - Day 7 (Sea Day)

'It is kind of funny.  You really lose track of what day it is once you get on a cruise ship and start going.  You lose access to internet connectivity and the world seems to shift a bit.  I think today was Wednesday the 27th.

We were up on the move fairly early.  Denise had some presentations that she wanted to attend.  So I got up early and went to the gym.  They really have a nice spa\gym on the boat.  And there were a lot of people there using it.  But I was able find the equipment I wanted to use open and available.  

After working out, I returned to shower and get ready for the day.  The outside air was really cold with a thick marine layer blocking most of the visibility.  So I knew long pants were in order.  I quickly showered and dressed because Denise wanted to get to a presentation on the Glaciers.  So off we went to stuff our selves on breakfast.  

The presentation was quite good.  I really enjoyed all the facts shared about glaciers and what we will see once we get into the fjords.  Apparently, we will not be able to go up the Tracy Arm Fjord as the ice has been breaking up so much and in such large chunks that is now a hazard to big boats like the one we are on.  So we will be traveling into another fjord close by that is every bit as beautiful.

After the presentation, it got a little boring.  We tried to find folks to play games and stuff.  But everyone kind of went their own ways.  We ended up with Dale and Julee playing Clue...well they played Clue while I just kind of lounged around.  We then ended up going to lunch with them.

After lunch, we went back to the same area where we played cards hoping that we can play with everyone.  But again...nobody showed up.  We did watch people around us play 'Reverse Charades' where everyone acted out a list of things while one person had to guess what it was.  It was pretty funny to watch.

By mid afternoon the marine layer had lifted and it became a beautiful day at sea.  Calm waters, sight of land to the east.  Dale,Denise and I laid out in one of the covered bungalows and watched the sea go by hoping to see whales or something.  But nothing.  Finally, it was time to go down and get ready for dinner...which was to be one of the two elegant nights.  But as we were getting ready, they started to announce that whales were being seen on both sides of the ship.  I had a few minutes, so I hurried up there to see a couple of whales breach in the distance.  Not nearly as good as what we saw in Newport, Oregon.

Dinner was yummy!  Prime Rib, Lobster Tail and large shrimp...although the the shrimp was not that large.  The appetizers were a variety of things but the one odd thing that Denise had was Alligator Fritters.  They were really good.

After dinner, because it was an elegant night, we had to get pictures taken 'professionally'.  We waited in line so long that we missed half of the theater production.  The show was Motown music and really quite good.  We liked what we saw so much that we decided to go back for the late show to see it from the beginning.  Very fun.

Well, tomorrow we start to see things as we cruise up the fjords.  Can't wait.....

Pictures:

Dale with the Cruise Director (Jaimee).  Leave it to Dale to catch up with the young Cruise Director.

Denise and I in a cabana....

The Cruise Director leading Zumba....

Nadine and Denise on the deck looking out over the sea....

Formal dinner night....

Dale and Julee celebrating 50 years....

The family (minus their son)......

2016 Alaska Cruise - Day 6 (Seattle, Boat Departure)

Today is July 26th and we are waking up at Jeff and Laura's place.  We were up fairly early getting ready for the day.  Laura served us some croissants and juice and then we headed off to Seattle to check out Pike's Market place.  The drive was pretty easy...not too much traffic.  Pike's Market is amazing.  So much food.  The flowers being sold there are relatively cheap and beautiful.  We spent about an hour exploring things out.  Our goal was to visit this until around 10:30 AM and then head to the pier to get on the ship.  Our schedule went very well as we did arrive at the boat promptly at 11 AM.

Our visit with Laura and Jeff was really short, really fun.  They were so hospitable and we owe them a lot.

Boarding the boat was fast and easy.  Upon checking in, we found Bruce, Nanette and Nadine sitting in the waiting area.  We were told that we were all to meet at 11 AM to get a picture before we board the boat.  However, some of the group was pretty far behind.  Since those who had flown in that day were tired and a bit hungry, they boarded the boat before all arrived.  Thus the initial picture taking opportunity was lost.  But heck...there will only be a few thousand pictures taken.  So I think all will be fine.  Anyway, when our group boarding was called, we also boarded the boat and headed straight to the.....Guest Services desk.  I know you all thought buffet...but that was 2nd!  We went to guest services to ask about our credit that was promised.  Turns out, we had to wait until the next day to get the credit.  I hope it comes.  OK...we then headed to the buffet.  Lots of food options.

After eating and finally seeing most everyone, we went down to our rooms and unpacked.  They were pretty quick in getting our luggage to our room.  We then headed up to the deck and began to enjoy the view of Seattle and wait for departure.  But before you depart you get the sinking boat tour.  They always say to remain calm and have you nicely lined up.  But we all know if the boat is sinking...there will be no calmness about it.  Pretty funny.  Anyway, off we went leaving the port of Seattle and out to the Pacific Ocean.  While doing that, we took lots of pictures and visited in the nice, sunny weather.

Dinner time for us will be at 5:30 PM throughout most of the cruise.  So before we knew it...it was time to eat again.  I know, hard to believe.  Dinner was pretty good.  As usual...lots of options to choose from.  I hope Denise took some pictures...like we usually do.

Lastly, most of us went to the Welcome Aboard show.  There you get introduced to the Cruise Directory.  Let me tell you about the Cruise Director....energy.  This gal is all over the stage with a ton of energy.  She is young and if she were not a Cruise Director, should be a Gymnast the way she flings her arms and legs.  After much attempt at humor, she introduced the performers that we'll see a few times in the evenings.  They danced pretty good and their singing was OK.  I hope it gets better though.

Around 10:30 PM....off to bed with lights out quickly (after blogging of course)....

Pictures:

Pikes Street Market.....

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Fish Market......

Tourists in Seattle....

Pasta galore at Pike's Market...

Finally on the boat....waiting to sail.

The whole group....

The whole group again...finally.

The group at the show after dinner....

2016 - Alaska Cruise - Day 5 (Seattle)

It is Monday, July 25th and it is the day that we leave Travis and Mackenzie to travel to Seattle to meet up with our friends, Laura and Jeff Krinsky.  My day started early, about 3 AM for me due to insomnia, in order to catch the Amtrak train from Albany, OR to Seattle, WA.  The train left at 6:11 AM and was a 6 hour trip. 

The trip was quite uneventful and very pretty.  The whole Oregon valley up to Portland is green and beautiful and then it just gets better as you head into Washington.  So much water in the Washington area making it very picturesque.  

While traveling, a couple of Grandma's and their grand daughters sat down by us.  They were headed to Seattle to have a Grandma\Grand Daughter date.  The girls were so excited and full of energy.  After a few minutes of traveling, a lady sitting behind one of the young girls stood up and reprimanded the young girl for moving around too much.  She said it in such a harsh way.  I wanted to stand up an rip the throat out of that lady.  That sent the young girl into a quiet cry with her grandma.  I felt so bad for her.  She was not doing anything and frankly, the lady could have just moved.  Some people are just mean and think only of themselves.  Anyway, Denise and I struck up a conversation quickly with the grandma's and the girls.  And soon the young girl was smiling again and having fun.  All was well again.

We arrived right on time in downtown Seattle.  Hooking up with Laura was a bit of challenge as none of us had been there before.  But after a few calls and after yelling down over a deck to Laura when I saw her drive up in her car, we reunited once again.  What a good friend Laura is and has been to Denise\us.  We immediately decided that we needed to get some lunch and decided on some seafood.  However, the first downtown location we went to, we could not find parking.  So we headed out of the downtown area towards the north and ended up in a nice restaurant on the water.  We had some yummy food there while we visited and visited.  At about 2;30, it was time to go pick up one of her son's in 'Robotics' camp.  They young guy was excited to see all of us.  We then walked to a small park nearby that had a playground to let him run around a bit before getting in the car to head out to Laura and Jeff's place.  I think it took nearly an hour to get out of that area and out to their home.  The traffic is horrible in the Seattle area.

We arrived to their beautiful home to find Jeff still working there.  They had moved some mattresses down to a play room where Denise and I would sleep that night.  We visited for a little while and then we all piled into their Yukon and drove to a Korean restaurant for some really great food.  Visit, visit, visit...we did that through the ending until it was time to retire and go to bed.  And that could have not come quickly enough for me having been awake since 3 AM.  I was tired.

Tomorrow, we board the boat to travel to Alaska.  We look forward to seeing all of Denise's siblings and parents there.  It should be a lot of fun.

Pictures:

Albany Train Station.....

Bridges across the water as we traveled into Washington....

Seattle train station....

Seattle baseball or football stadium...not sure.

Laura and Denise on the water front for lunch....

The whole Krinsky gang having Korean food.....

2016 Alaska Cruise - Day 1, 2, 3, 4 (Albany, OR)

Welcome to another summer adventure with Tim and Denise.  This trip will be a special one as we honor Dale and Julee's 50th Wedding Anniversary by traveling to Seattle to get on a cruise ship and cruise to Alaska.  It is going to be so fun.  But first......

Denise and I, rather than traveling stand by on United, decided to use our air mile points from previous trips on Delta to fly direct to Eugene Oregon.  As it turns out, we would not have been able to get on a flight out of SLC on United as most flights were over sold.  So we made a great decision there.  We arrived in Eugene at 12:15 and was met by our wonderful kids (Travis and Mackenzie) who are out here selling pest control services.  They live in Albany, Oregon which is about a 50 minute drive north of Eugene.

After loading our baggage into their nice, new to them, car, we headed off looking for some lunch.  Travis had looked up a Diner's, Drive-In's and Dive location that he thought sounded fun.  We arrived and drove around the block looking for this sandwich shop many times.  It turned out that it was a small trailer sitting in a small little area with some picnic tables out in front of it.  Yes...we found it finally. But it was worth the wait.  The sandwiches were really quite good...much more than we needed.

After our meal, we drove Travis to his area in Eugene where he is selling the services.  Timing was good because his whole team is in Eugene for the next few weeks selling.  So we had to drop him off there and leave him to go get some 'sales'.  They are lucky to get one sale a day...and two a day is pretty good.  Crazy work.  Anyway...we left him there and headed to Albany.

We arrived at their apartment here around 3 PM.  We kind of just hung out until we had to take Mackenzie (with Madison, my nephew's wife) to this little warehouse area where they work in a small office answering phones for the same company that these guys work for (Pointe Pest Control).  Pretty scary, isolated area, it is.  I hope they lock the doors when there.  Anyway, Denise and I returned to the apartment where I worked a bit online and Denise read some books.  Later, we picked up Mackenzie around 8:30 PM and came home and waited until Travis returned home...around 10 PM.

Our trip has begun.....

Day Two:

Day 2 was a work day for me.  So I started around 6 AM and worked until about 3:30 PM'ish.  When everyone was up, we went with Austin, Madison, Travis and Mackenzie to Elmer's...a breakfast house. The food was really good.  From there, we returned back to the apartment and Travis and Austin went off to work.  A bit later, Denise and Mackenzie went shopping for some material to make a quilt for Mackenzie.  I worked.  :-)  At about 3:45, we took Mackenzie and Madison to work again.  Then Denise and I went to visit Miranda to see their new baby.  Miranda is the wife of another nephew of mine here.  I have 3 nephews and a son of my cousins (Rachel) who are all working out here.  We had a nice visit with Miranda and their baby was sleeping...so we just got to view him...not hold him.  He is a beautiful baby boy!

After visiting a bit there, we headed off to go to the movies.  I'm always amazed how much more expensive a movie is outside the state of Utah.  Nonetheless, we saw the new Star Trek movie.  The theater, well, it is similar to the Bountiful theater (only you pay twice as much here).  And from what I can tell, it is the only theater in Albany (7 screens).  A fellow sitting just down from us thought the movie was a comedy!  He laughed through the whole darn thing...out loud.  Even in the most serious points, he'd start cracking up.  People were dying and he was laughing.  It caused us all to chuckle and look at him.  Anyway, I did not realize I was going to a comedy.

After watching the movie, I took their car to a car wash to shine it up for them as it had lots of bugs on it. I think this was Travis doing free pest control the past few weeks.  Anyway, the car shined up nicely.  After doing that, we headed back to pick up Mackenzie from work and headed back to the apartment. There, she had prepared some really good zucchini boat things that were soooo good.  I had not eaten anything since breakfast.  And by the time we ate...10 PM...I was starving.   But it is not good to eat that late...at least for me.  But these kids, due to their schedules, eat then always!  Bummer.

Day Three:

I am writing this waiting for everyone to get up and go.  I think we are headed up to Portland since none of us have been there before (other than in airports).  Travis decided to take his last vacation day today.  That was surprising...but we are glad to spend more time with him.  He is trying to get to 150 sales and he is at 130 with about 3 weeks left.  I hope he makes it.  

Portland was a lot of fun.  We weren't quite sure what we were going to do up there...but in the end, it was a full day.  We first headed to downtown Portland searching for a good doughnut...and found the famous VooDoo Dougnut shop.  It only took 45 minutes in line, one plate of nachos from a food truck while waiting to spend $28 on a dozen doughnuts.  I must say, they were all really yummy and they have lasted 3 days almost.  My favorite, actually was the boring old Buttermilk doughnut.  I did get one that was called 'The Champ'.  It had a lemon frosting on it and was filled with cherry filling.  They made it look like a baseball.  Anyway....all of them were so rich.  We did not need that many.

After getting the doughnuts, we walked through a street fair over to the river.  There we sat down and sampled the doughnuts we had just purchased.  It was fun to watch the people and see some of the shops.  After about 2 hours of doughnut waiting and consumption, we headed off to see the Portland Rose Gardens.  We easily found them but parking was an issue.  We eventually found a spot and then jumped on a bus that took you through the park making many stops along the way.  In addition to the Rose Gardens, the Japanese Gardens and the Oregon Zoo were also found in this park.  The park is actually on a hillside which made the travel interesting too.  Nonetheless, it was fun and relaxing.

After leaving the gardens, we headed to a deli called out by the Diners, Drive-ins and Dive show.  Unfortunately, traffic was crazy and our GPS was not real clear on where a split occurred at and we ended up missing the exit.  So we just continued on to the Portland Temple.  The temple sits right on I5, kind of like the San Diego Temple.  Boy is it pretty!  There were many bridal parties there.

After leaving the temple grounds, we headed down back to Albany.  The sales team was going to celebrate their good week by purchasing wings and pizza and going to a park to play some soccer.  There were some 30 people who showed up of the boys and their wives and friends who were out visiting.  It was a very nice evening visiting with all the kids.  The weather here in Albany is cool and pleasant.

Day Four:

Today was the Sabbath so we got up and attended our church meetings.  The ward was so friendly and nice.  It was a nice 3 hours.  Brings us comfort that Travis and Mackenzie are around really nice people.  After church, we relaxed a bit and then with Austin, Madison, Dalin, Miranda, Beau and Tyler we headed to Newport...an Oregon beach town.  We paid to get into a park where a lighthouse was called Yaquina Point.  As we were walking out to the lighthouse, we noticed a rock moving down in the water.  It was a gray WHALE!!  I saw my first whale in open water.  It was huge.  We watched that whale for quite awhile as we walked out to the lighthouse and back.  We also went down to a black sand beach to play around there.

After leaving Yaquina, we headed to a restaurant to get some food as most everyone was hungry.  We found a place on Nye Beach called the 'Chowder Bowl'.  We ended up getting a table for 10 and enjoyed some pretty good seafood and chowder.  Very yummy.  After that we headed down to Nye Beach where we played Bocci Ball and watched people fly their kites.  It was pretty cool and windy...but it felt good to be at the ocean again.  

After few hours on the beach, we headed back to Albany.  We arrived back around 9:00PM.  I had to pack my bags quickly.  Then after visiting with Austin, Madison, Travis and Mackenzie, we headed off to bed with our hearts and minds on Karlie and Dustin back in Utah and the life changing events taking place in their lives there.

Tomorrow, early, we get on an Amtrak train and head to Seattle.

Pictures:

Pointe Salesman off to do his work.....

Part of the sales crew after a game of knock out....

Lunch in Eugene....the Sandwich League.

Denise and Mackenzie at the food truck.....

Glad to see each other again.......

Our handsome son and his beautiful mother....

Baby Daniel (Dalin and Miranda's First Born).....

Our drive to Portland begins....

Nachos while waiting in line for Voodoo Doughnuts....

Our dougnut box....

The prized doughnut possessions....

Sampling a few.....

Travis and Mackenzie at the Rose Garden...

Denise in a field of yellow roses...

Check out the true photo bombers in the background....

Having a great time seeing the Portland area with those we love....

Portland Temple....so pretty.

Beau with his nephew (Daniel) at the soccer fields.....

Yaquina Lighthouse with Travis, Mackenzie, Denise and I....

Herb i.e. the gray whale!!!

Down on the beach with the whole crew....

The whole crew again...Tyler, Beau, Madison, Austin, Travis, Mackenzie, Denise and I....

Nye Beach...

Yummy clam chowder at the Chowder Bowl.....

The Yaquina Lighthouse from Nye Beach...

Ladder Ball at Nye Beach.....notice the stroller that has a line that is attached to a kite.  That's the way to fly a kite!