If I do not attempt to document the remainder of our time in our wonderful country's beautiful 49th state, I fear that the memories will be gone forever. Especially since, in the way of things these days, if something didn't happen today, I don't remember it at all. (Par exemple, when someone asked me on Tuesday this week what we had done over the weekend, my mind went utterly blank. "Let's see...this weekend...hmmm...that was two days ago, right? We must have done some...thing...but, I...don't have...any...idea. We are all still alive, though, so I guess that means that nothing too terrible happened.")
I know I won't remember everything about the rest of our cruise excursions perfectly, which makes me really sad and sorry for not having documented everything before now, but I will forgive myself since I have been in complete survival mode these last few months, focusing only on the very necessary and consuming tasks of keeping six small children alive and fed and loved. And somewhat clean.
That being said...on to Juneau!
We woke up on the morning of our Juneau day to stunning and amazing glacial views. Being a California and Arizona girl my whole life, I have never actually been in or near water with chunks of ice floating in it. (The closest thing I've gotten to that is the decidedly unexciting cubes of ice floating in my cup of water, and even that doesn't last more than a few minutes in these parts.)
It was so amazing and gorgeous to see. Watching the ship cut a path through the green water and pieces of glacier was a sight to behold. I mean, it was no Titanic moment (thank goodness!), but still, a very cool thing to experience. (And by "experience," I mean, "watch from a very safe distance in a very warm jacket.")
One of the coolest things was to see the pool and waterslide on the top deck of the cruise ship juxtaposed (don't you love that word?) against the backdrop of a dull, gray sky, snowy-capped mountains, and glacial waters.
We didn't actually dock for a few hours, so we enjoyed the views in the morning and then read and rested until we disembarked. (Another favorite word of mine. Reminds me of Disneyland.)
Our fabulous excursion in Juneau was a dinnertime humpback whale-watching tour. Linda and I had done something similar in Hawaii in 2012, which made this extra cool. The whales leave the Alaskan waters in the fall and spend the winter months in Hawaii breeding and having their babies. In the spring, they head back to colder waters to feed. So in the Hawaiian Spring of 2012, we got a glimpse of the whales before they were heading to Alaska to feed, and in the Alaskan Fall of 2015, we got to see them before they headed to Hawaii to breed. (You're welcome for the unsolicited biology lesson.)
I didn't get many great shots, but I did love the whole thing. They boat captain said that the whales were particularly active that day, more than he had seen for most of the season, so we chased groups of them all around the bay to get a good view and our tour ended up taking longer than it was supposed to. (Okay, so maybe they say that to all the tourists, but it still made us feel special.)
Alaska 2015
Hawaii 2012
Ha ha, just kidding. That top picture is a plastic whale. The real thing looked a lot more like this one. Not quite as dramatic, but still very cool.
Okay, so, one more day of Alaskan Adventure down. Just a couple more to go.
Sigh. Looking at these pictures sure makes me want to go on vacation somewhere far, far, far away.
What can I say? I'm a tourist at heart.
(Either that or my life is just a little hard right now and I am ready for a break.)
Up next is Skagway, my very favorite of all of our Alaskan destinations.
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