Cruising Tracy Arm Fjord

Wednesday morning we cruised Tracy Arm Fjord. It was a beautiful day of no rain and some blue sky overhead.

 We even saw a rainbow.

Since there was a glacier deep inside the fjord, we started seeing lots of icebergs in the water. Yes, the thought "Titanic" and the saying "it's just the tip of the iceberg" came to mind as we frequently got very close to some of the icebergs.

We got deep into the passageway with steep mountain walls on both sides of us.

 More and more icebergs in the water.

Look at the unique blue color of the icebergs. We had a naturalist on board who was giving a running commentary the whole time we were cruising the fjord. He said someone has described the glacier blue color as Windex blue.

Another cruise ship came our way on its way out of the fjord.

Here comes the glacier into view.

There are harbor seals living on the ice at the base of the glacier.

This is a good view of the Windex blue color of the glacier.

The captain had done a great job getting deep into the fjord and up close to the glacier. Apparently it was the farthest the ship had gone inside the passageway and we were able to view the glacier for a few minutes before the captain maneuvered a U-turn of the ship and we were on our way back out of there.

This is how close we had been to some of the bigger icebergs.

Soon we were back in water that was free of any icebergs.

We saw a group of kayakers floating along close to the water's edge. You have to look close to see them.

It had been such a beautiful day for cruising Tracy Arm Fjord. This was something we hadn't done on our previous Alaskan cruise and we really enjoyed seeing the new scenery.

Look at us all enjoying our lunch buffet. There is one thing from the buffet I decided we should implement back here at home. They provided not just plates, but platters  for us to fill with food. It's such a great idea!

Soon it was the moment everyone had been waiting for...egg drop time!!! The whole family got involved in the process. We met at the Piazza and got the raw egg and then had about 15 minutes to get the egg cushioned and ready for dropping.

Not shown here was how we wrapped the egg in toilet paper then put it inside two styrofoam cups taped together rim to rim that were filled with popcorn. That would be the smaller cup formation. Nani got busy taping four stacks of cups together.

Someone suggested using a plastic bag as a parachute-type device and Glen was trying to figure out if it should be attached to the inner egg part of the contraption.

Nani and Kathy helped get the egg secured inside the four columns of styrofoam cups.

Then Glen, Dad and Andy got the parachute sack attached--to the outside cups.

The egg was ready for take-off (with hopefully a gentle landing).

As Glen was running up the two flights of stairs, the announcer was telling everyone the egg needed to land in the bull's eye to get the most points. If it landed in the area between the red circle and the red tape circle beyond the bull's eye, it would still get points, but less points than hitting the bull's eye. If it got beyond the red tape line circle, it would get no points.

This whole target landing thing was not on the paper of instructions we had gotten several days earlier when we registered to enter the contest and I was sure Glen was not listening to the additional rules. I was so afraid he wouldn't try to drop the egg to hit the target.

We learned there had been a third participant sign up, so we were up against two other competitors. The two little boys wanted their egg to go last, so Glen immediately volunteered to go first. Sure enough--just as I had feared--he hadn't heard the bull's eye commentary and he hurried right over to the railing. He was standing off-center and launched the styrofoam-rocket-ship-like contraption high into the air instead of centering himself over the target mark and gently letting go of it so it would fall right on the target.

I don't know what Glen was thinking (we would later find out) with that launching throw upward and off-center. All I knew was he had horribly missed the mark by a long shot when we watched it land on the step by the white piano.

Bernie, one of the assistant cruise directors, got busy unwrapping the egg to see if it had survived the drop. Three judges were making notes on their clipboard of everything that was going on.

TA DA!!!!! The egg was intact and had survived the fall. Hurrah for Team Egg-stravaganza!!

Turns out Glen had not heard any of the target announcement and didn't pay any attention to try aiming for the bull's eye. I am still wondering why he didn't think that big red circle meant something.

He tossed the contraption up in hopes the plastic bag would have a better chance of getting some air in it on its way down to the ground. That was a failure as well since the bag did not inflate.

Regardless of all that, we were ecstatic Mr. Egghead survived the fall. (We had originally named the egg Humpty Dumpty, but Kathy thought that might jinx the egg since the real Humpty Dumpty did not survive his fall.)

The second team dropped their egg and it survived the fall. Their egg was wrapped in a scarf inside a big bag of popcorn. Their egg landed with part of it on the bull's eye.

The last team, consisting of the two little brothers, also had a surviving egg. They had a small, can-like container they put their egg inside--also nestled in a little bit of popcorn. To that they had attached some balloons. Theirs definitely fell slower than the other two, but it landed away from the target.

Basically, what happened was all the eggs survived the drop and it boiled down to (no egg pun intended) whose egg hit the target. NOT US!!! Boo hoo!!! And not the two little boys either. That was also super sad.

Well, that was cause for me to drown my sorrows in cheesecake. After all, the International Cafe was right by the Piazza. Some other family members decided to join me as well, although I don't know what Sam was thinking when he got something other than cheesecake.

Kathy even decided to forgo chocolate to eat some cheesecake as well.

Several times throughout the cruise, we went to the Princess Theater during the day to listen to Naturalist Michael Modzelewski give different lectures about things having to do with Alaska.

Looks like Mark opted for an afternoon snack of an ice cream cone. What's up with that? Ice cream over cheesecake?

Two Russian dancers performed a couple of different times on the ship.

At dinner, after the appetizers and salad courses, we were all given this sorbet-type stuff to eat as a palate cleanser. It was the first and only time that happened.

Loved the dessert presentations. And just in case anyone was wondering...I didn't eat either one of these--I ordered cheesecake again.

After dinner we went outside to enjoy the gorgeous sunset.

Beautiful ending to another wonderful day.

A Day In Skagway

We had a whole day to spend in Skagway. My siblings took off on a day-long train ride taking them all around and into Canada and back. My parents took a tour of the city and went to see a play.

As usual, Glen felt like we had already seen and done Skagway and so our plan was to just walk around the little town and stretch our legs.

Also as usual--it was raining that day.

We learned from our last cruise to Skagway about the paintings all along the rock wall where the ships come in. It has been a tradition for the last century for ships to record their ship and captain's name and the date it arrived for the first time in Skagway.

Skagway is a beautiful, quaint little town to walk through.

The historic Red Onion Saloon once operated as one of the most famous bordellos in Skagway and is a popular stop for tourists.

We stopped instead to watch the Days of '98 Show about Skagway's most notorious outlaw Soapy Smith during the days of the Klondike Gold Rush.

Turns out this was the same play Mom and Dad went to see.

There were many totem poles we saw while in Alaska. Which of these things is not like the other?

As we were doing what the rest of the tourists in Skagway were doing--walking up and down the streets and looking at all the stores--one particular store caught our eye. Nestled amid all the regular, touristy-type shops was a regular hardware store.

We synchronized our steps with an eager hop, skip and a jump (excuse this silly little statement because I just watched a synchronized swimming routine on the Olympics and it made an impression on my mind...) making our way quickly into the store.

We just knew there was going to be something that would catch our eye signaling the most perfect thing for us to use for our egg drop competition.

As we were wandering around the store, we both overheard a conversation going on between another tourist couple walking the aisles near us. The husband made this profound statement to his wife, "Honey, this is really just a hardware store." What did they expect? Look at the sign out front. It says very plainly: Hardware Co.

At the exact same moment (synchronization coming into play again), Glen and I turned down an aisle away from the couple and simultaneously burst into laughter. It was so funny! We were absolutely thrilled to be in a hardware store and apparently they were very disappointed it was just a hardware store.

Something in the hardware store did catch our eye that we felt would be perfect for our upcoming egg drop project. We bought a package of styrofoam cups and a roll of masking tape. The hardware store checker did not provide us with a sack to carry our purchases.

As we walked out of town, noticing the beautiful scenery as we went, we saw lots of our fellow passengers making their way back to the ship along with us. The only difference between us and them is they all had their purchases nestled inside store bags advertising the quaint shops they had frequented. We were left wondering just exactly what they might have purchased.

I felt very silly walking along with our cups and tape right out there for everyone to see...and wonder about... Glen was most worried our competition would see us and then know our plan of action.

We had a little time in the afternoon to chill out in the cabin. Nothing like getting all comfy and cozy reading a good book.

Dinner is always a welcome thing to look forward to each evening. Shockingly, I only took one picture of food this particular night.

We went out on our balcony to take a look around as the ship was leaving the port.

I had a little fun taking a picture of the reflection of us in our sliding glass door.

We went up top of the ship to take a look around as the ship was sailing out of Skagway.

I got a huge kick out of these three characters who were up viewing the scene as well.

We almost didn't see them. They were in camo and blended in with the scenery.

Then the faces of my brothers Andy, Mike and Sam came into view. I'm just wondering if baby brother Mark felt left out of the group since he didn't (at least to my knowledge) come aboard the ship with either a camouflage coat or a pair of binoculars.

There certainly is one thing Mark can be pleased about and that is the gorgeous picture he took while they were on their train excursion.

This is the description Michelle sent with this photo she said I could post on the blog: The lake is in BC Canada, right next to the Yukon border. And we think it's Tutshi Lake, but it could be the lake before that which is Tagish Lake. So, whatever you feel like calling it... :)

This is what I feel like calling it: MAGNIFICENTLY BEAUTIFUL!!!

No wonder my brothers walk around with binoculars at the ready. There is so much beauty to be seen in Alaska. One can hardly take it all in.