June 15 - Cruise On!

Neither of us slept well last night (or all week) so we were up earlyish and finished our packing to get ready to go. The lack of darkness plus the street noise adversely affected our sleep all week (there isn't any central AC in Alaska, so you have to keep your windows open when it gets warm or sunny). Since I had done all of my packing the previous evening and Leon can pack really quickly, we had a leisurely morning and we left a bit earlier than we had planned.

We had to do a few things on our way out of town - gas up the 

car before returning it and find some non-drowsy motion 

sickness medicine for me. Gas was easy enough to find but 

medicine could not be found, so we prayed for smoother 

sailing on the open ocean than we had on the last cruise.

We returned our Turo car without incident and the Lyft I 

ordered arrived promptly - it was a BMW iX (an EV). We

hadn't ridden in one of these, so this was an unexpected

treat. We were needed to meet our bus that would take us

back to Whittier to get on the cruise ship. There were places

all around town (mostly hotels) that the bus picked up from. 

Leon had selected a hotel that was a stone's throw from a 

buffet restaurant - Golden Corral, or as I have dubbed it 

Golden Trough. This was easily the worst meal of our trip. I 

won't delve into more than to say that I was very ready to get 

out of there as soon as possible.  At least it was an easy walk

from there to our pick-up point to board the bus, which

was important since we were carrying our own bags.

 

We were picked up by a smaller bus that was making the 

the rounds to the various hotels and then took us to the airport 

to board the large bus taking us the 2 hours to Whittier. 

One last shot of Turnagain Arm taken from the bus.

While the bus was comfortable, being brand new, the ride

wasn't so pleasant for Leon. Our driver to Whittier felt

compelled to narrate the entire time, believing himself to be

entertaining and funny. He was neither. I had my earbuds, so I

was able to listen to music to drown out the narration. Leon 

had packed his earbuds in the luggage that was stored below, 

so he had to suffer through the entire ride. The only wildlife we 

saw were a few bald eagles.

 

When we arrived at the port, we decided to board the ship

directly instead of walking around Whittier which we had

considered. We had a bite to eat in the Lido buffet and then

walked around the ship awhile before we settled in the

library. I picked out Jack London's Call of the Wild to read 

since it is set during the Klondike Gold Rush of 1897.

We made it back to our room which was as expected (inside

room, no free upgrade this cruise), unpacked, and Leon did a

spa cycle while I did some more reading before dinner. We

debated a few dinner options and decided to eat in the dining

room this evening. Our table for two was a few tables away

from the windows; even so, Leon managed two good whale

sightings during dinner, including one where two whales

showed much of their backs before diving. We looked quite a

bit for more sightings the rest of the evening but there were no

more.

 

We relaxed in the Crow's Nest for a while before retiring to bed

around 10:00. While there was plenty of light outside, the

darkness and quiet of our inside room were most welcome and

we slept in until after 8:00 the next morning.