We had to put Ziggy and Zoe in jail for 3 weeks while took a trip to Minnesota, Alaska, and Canada in July, 2017. Zoe gets pills every day and not everyone can get her to take them so he had to board them.
Last year we considered a cruise that started in Alaska and wend to Russia and Japan, but decided against it, but the idea for an Alaska visit stayed with us and in May or early June we booked a cruise starting from Anchorage and ending in Vancouver. Because flights were a little messy anyway we decided to pay a visit to our friend from India who lived down a floor below us in Bangalore. This meant a stopover of a couple days in Minneapolis- St. Paul. She gave us a nice tour of the cities, its restaurants and museums! Here is one picture from grounds near one museum where outdoor sculptures are placed. After that very pleasant visit we flew on to Anchorage and stayed overnight at the Captain Cook Hotel- which was very nice. We took a little walk around town but did not have much time there. In the morning, after breakfast, we boarded a bus to go to Seward where the ships are docked. We boarded the ship but had plenty of time to get off and visit the town. The highway was quite scenic and we caught only a glimpse of some Dahl sheep on the cliffs along the road. The main sight for us in Seward was the marine animal facility where they have fish, seals and sea birds.
It was a good photo-op and we got some animals that are less common in the east. We went back to the ship and departed Seward for some fjords, glaciers and bays not too far away that we saw the next day.
If you look closely at the glacier picture you can see some kayaks- they give you an idea of the scale! After seeing our first glaciers the shipped headed east for a day to near Juneau. The weather was rather dreary- rainy and chilly and overcast when not rainy, but all the locals reminded us that southeast Alaska is a big rainforest where 100" of rain a year is common.
We saw our first humpback whale not far from Juneau. We often saw mist in the air where one exhaled but never got a really exciting view of any. The most we saw of them is a tail sticking out of the water. Janet got sick about this time and was not able to do much for a few days, but the weather was not so great - as mentioned - for a bit either. In Juneau she stayed on the ship and Jim went off once or twice and walked around. He took the tram to Mt. Roberts which offered some views of the area and also had a small center housing a rescued Bald Eagle,
so it was the first one seen up close.
The ship moved to Haines overnight- this is a bit further in amongst the fjords. Janet was still under the weather, but the the sun was out in Haines. Jim took a boat trip on a river where more bald eagles were seen but no bear or moose.
He got one picture of an eagle with its catch. We went on on better weather to Sitka, Wrangell and Ketchikan. At Sitka they have quite a nice Raptor center where they take in injured birds and if they heal then release them again. The little owl below is one that is a permanent resident. It is less than 6" tall and very cute.
The sunset was one of several we saw that were quite nice- with a bit different cloud cover they would have been spectacular.
The bald eagle nest is one seen in the back country near a river- that is probably one of the parents with its head up. They told us that the young were probably too small to put their heads up yet.
The iceberg is in a lake below a glacier in wilderness again. The glacier itself is further up toward the peak in the background. The boat used here was fairly small and shallow draught so it could get into the lake from its exit stream. The captain has a depth gauge that routinely showed depths of 600' and we saw as must as 800'. He said he has seen 1000' in this lake. The depth near the glacier was around 300'- so he said there could be huge chunks of ice suddenly popping up from far below- with disastrous consequences for a small boat! So he does not spend much time close to the glacier itself. Danger from pieces falling from above or poping up from below. The iceberg here was about 30' tall above the water line.
There are some nice museums and shops that have fine examples of native Americn arts and crafts. We learned that the Canadian people prefer the term "first nations people". It does make sense- there was nothing called America when their ancestors first came to the area and they formed to first nations.
At Prince Rupert, Canada , Jim signed up for a larger boat trip into a wilderness area that is a reserve for brown or grizzly bears. We had not seen any bears on our other stops so he was hopeful about this one and it turned out to be good. On the way to the reserve we passed some rocky islands where lots of seals were sunning themselves.
In the reserve area we ended up seeing 5 bears- 3 were by themselves but toward the end we saw the two in the picture. Mostly that eat grass in this area in July, later it may be Salmon. One went in the water and walked and looked but went back to the grass in the end.
On leaving the resevere we saw a number of Bald Eagles.
We also saw some humpback whale sprays and humps- not that exciting and we saw this group of 3 or 4 Orcas. We learned that Orcas (killer whales) are very intelligent and they will hunt together to get pray that one by itself might not get. They eat mostly seals but it sounds like they will eat other things too- like sharks if they feel their young might be in danger.
So, the Prince Rupert trip was to most fruitful for seeing wild life in the wild! Jim did see moose track in an earlier excursion up a river when they stopped at an outhouse- but no moose.
We stopped at a First Nations village at Klemtu, Canada where the village came out to the town meeting house and did some simple dances and played some music. They dressed in traditional costumes and it was quite nice- the little kids especially. The ship brought food, tables and chairs to shore to feed everyone from the ship. It was a nice outing but we felt out of place even though the people were welcoming. There is a small newer hotel in town by the water which looked very nice.
Our next stop was Alert Bay, Canada. This is another small town on an island. We go off and walked around awhile. We came to the "totem park" shown in the picture. They had a sign asking people not to enter out of respect for the local people but it was easy to see from the path nearby since they keep it mowed.
We learned that the totem have various purposes and meanings. Some are memorials, some are where ashes of ancestors are placed, some tell stories, some tell about bad things other people have done to them. Some are fairly new and some can be more than 100 years old- they are allowed to rot and return to nature. Some in this area have fallen down and are left there. There was a trail some woods and a swamp at the top of the hill on the island that was nice, but the sky turned overcast to make it less pleasant.
Our last stop was Vancouver. We left the ship fairly early and transferred to our Hotel for 2 nights. We walked to an area called Gastown after a stop at a very good small museum- the Bill Reid Gallery. Reid was a top notch artist and the gallery has works by lots of other artists and crafts people. In Gatown we had to stop to see and hear the "steam clock". The clock itself is electric but it has steam whistles that play the Westminster Chimes every 15 min, then it counts the hour with toots from the larger whistle in top. It was not that loud and it was fun to see. Lots of people come to see it. Gastown has lots of arts and crafts shops, some are just trinkets while others are high quality.
We walked a lot this day and had a good dinner at the hotel where we saw another couple we had met on the ship. The next day we went to the Museum of Anthropology that was very much worthwhile.
They have all sort of decorative arts from around the world- with a concentration on "first nations" arts and crafts. It was overwhelming with room after room of very high quality works every where. We spent most of the time looking at the first nations carvings and masks. This was fairly tiring so when we took a taxi to Granville Island we were pretty tired already but we walked more and saw more there - mostly it was trinkets- but there were a few shops with higher quality items. We took the "aquabus" - a little ferry - to the main part of Vancouver and our restaurant- "Anacore" for fairly early dinner. We were tired so it was nice to sit and it was warm so we sat outside overlooking the water. The food was excellent- a mixed of Peruvian and Japanese- we think. We then returned to our hotel and mostly packed up for early departure in the morning.
Sunday morning we had a good ride to the airport, went through customs and immigration at the Vancouver airport and flew Air Canada to Newark airport- around a 5 hour flight. We had not been to Newark for probably 10 years so, we were unpleasantly surprised by how rundown our terminal was.
In any case we got home safely and got Ziggy and Zoe out of jail the next day. They were happy the see us and be back home and seem to have forgiven us for their ordeal.
Last year we considered a cruise that started in Alaska and wend to Russia and Japan, but decided against it, but the idea for an Alaska visit stayed with us and in May or early June we booked a cruise starting from Anchorage and ending in Vancouver. Because flights were a little messy anyway we decided to pay a visit to our friend from India who lived down a floor below us in Bangalore. This meant a stopover of a couple days in Minneapolis- St. Paul. She gave us a nice tour of the cities, its restaurants and museums! Here is one picture from grounds near one museum where outdoor sculptures are placed. After that very pleasant visit we flew on to Anchorage and stayed overnight at the Captain Cook Hotel- which was very nice. We took a little walk around town but did not have much time there. In the morning, after breakfast, we boarded a bus to go to Seward where the ships are docked. We boarded the ship but had plenty of time to get off and visit the town. The highway was quite scenic and we caught only a glimpse of some Dahl sheep on the cliffs along the road. The main sight for us in Seward was the marine animal facility where they have fish, seals and sea birds. 
The ship moved to Haines overnight- this is a bit further in amongst the fjords. Janet was still under the weather, but the the sun was out in Haines. Jim took a boat trip on a river where more bald eagles were seen but no bear or moose.
At Prince Rupert, Canada , Jim signed up for a larger boat trip into a wilderness area that is a reserve for brown or grizzly bears. We had not seen any bears on our other stops so he was hopeful about this one and it turned out to be good. On the way to the reserve we passed some rocky islands where lots of seals were sunning themselves.
We stopped at a First Nations village at Klemtu, Canada where the village came out to the town meeting house and did some simple dances and played some music. They dressed in traditional costumes and it was quite nice- the little kids especially. The ship brought food, tables and chairs to shore to feed everyone from the ship. It was a nice outing but we felt out of place even though the people were welcoming. There is a small newer hotel in town by the water which looked very nice.
Our next stop was Alert Bay, Canada. This is another small town on an island. We go off and walked around awhile. We came to the "totem park" shown in the picture. They had a sign asking people not to enter out of respect for the local people but it was easy to see from the path nearby since they keep it mowed.
Our last stop was Vancouver. We left the ship fairly early and transferred to our Hotel for 2 nights. We walked to an area called Gastown after a stop at a very good small museum- the Bill Reid Gallery. Reid was a top notch artist and the gallery has works by lots of other artists and crafts people. In Gatown we had to stop to see and hear the "steam clock". The clock itself is electric but it has steam whistles that play the Westminster Chimes every 15 min, then it counts the hour with toots from the larger whistle in top. It was not that loud and it was fun to see. Lots of people come to see it. Gastown has lots of arts and crafts shops, some are just trinkets while others are high quality.
Sunday morning we had a good ride to the airport, went through customs and immigration at the Vancouver airport and flew Air Canada to Newark airport- around a 5 hour flight. We had not been to Newark for probably 10 years so, we were unpleasantly surprised by how rundown our terminal was.
In any case we got home safely and got Ziggy and Zoe out of jail the next day. They were happy the see us and be back home and seem to have forgiven us for their ordeal.
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