Alaska! Home of the “Last Frontier”. This trip was on our bucket list for a while and was Barb’s last state to visit. We love nature and where better to experience it than Alaska. But how do we see it? It’s a huge state with little population, so getting around is not that easy. The state only has about 17,000 miles of roads and only 6,000 are paved, (Florida by comparison has over 120,000 miles) so car is not exactly the best form of transportation. As a matter of fact flying is probably the transportation of choice with Anchorage boasting the largest seaplane airport in the world! And if you live here and want to travel to your state capital, Juneau? It’s either seaplane or boat. there are no roads going to Juneau. So with that said we chose to experience Alaska by cruise ship. For those of you who know me, cruising is not something I’ve ever wanted to do. I don’t like crowds, I’m not much for entertainemnt venues, I’m not much for canned tours and I’m not much of a joiner either. Oh, I also hate cold weather.
But there we were on the “Ovation of the Sea” a huge ship! With more rooms than most hotels for 6 nights, and I made it! Actually it wasn’t that bad. Barb is a joiner, so she found lots to do, whether it be HipHop dance classes or her favorite, bumper cars where you could find her most nights ramming the daylights out of the few kids that were on the ship. She also went to many nightly shows which featured music or comedians. I on the other hand spent a fare amount of my time in our cabin reading, sleeping or enjoying the scenery from our balcony. I walked most days up on the top deck too. And we both ate way too much! The food was good for the most part. We ate buffets for breakfast and lunch from a huge spread(I actually ate Indian food mosts days off the buffet which was very good), then a plated meal at dinner and there was food available for snacks at many outlets throughout the day. I thought the kitchen crew did a nice job considering the volume that they’re dealing with.
Our cabin was actually perfect for us. The size was descent, with a Queen bed, desk, couch and a huge sliding patio door on to the balcony. We were on the 10th floor and like I said I really enjoyed our view. The down sides of the trip? Other than what I mentioned earlier I would have liked more time ashore, less structured and in areas that weren’t so touristy. Each stopped seemed to be very similar for the most part and we went from a crowd on a ship to a crowd in a small seaside town. So, this being our 1st cruise would we do another? Probably not. We both agreed that this isn’t our style of travel, certainly not on a big ship again. We might give a smaller ship (maybe river boat?) a try.
The second part of the trip was a visit to Denali, where we became members of the 30% club. It seems that Denali is so high that it creates its own weather patterns. This causes the mountain to be frequently covered by clouds, like 70% of the time! We were lucky enough to be there when the clouds parted for a few minutes and presto I’m a member of a very special club. Our trip up to the mountain started with an awfully long bus ride from Seward through the interior, spent a night at a lodge at the edge of the park, toured by bus some of the park (much of the park is presently closed to traffic because of a landslide) the next day, then hopped a scenic train back down to Anchorage. Whew, that was a lot of travel crammed into two days. I would say of all the places we stopped Denali, other than our bear hike in Icy Straits was probably the highlight and someplace I might want to revisit on my own. It has incredibly beautiful scenery and wildlife that made it worth the trip.
We got to see Dall sheep, a Grizzly bear, caribou and a huge bull moose and his haram. They were for the most part quite a distance away and only visible with binoculars except the moose and we were viewing them through a bus window for the most part, but a cool sight just the same. Next year the park is supposed to open back up and I wonder if there will be closer access to the higher altitudes where most of the wildlife hung out. That would be well worth a return visit.
So there you have it. We survived our first cruise, Alaska made the trip well worth i. So check out my pictures and a few videos here.
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