Pictures to Come - Eventually

I have tried three different times to upload some pictures, but the ship's internet is not being very cooperative. I should be able to post them when we arrive at our hotel in Seattle on Saturday night.

When we were in Juneau on Wednesday, we visited the Mendenhall Glacier. (Pix to come) We hiked to a gorgeous waterfall. (Pix to come) In order to reach the waterfall, we had to maneuver - climb - over a 200 foot long stretch of boulders. (Pix to come) I stepped into a crevice, and twisted my ankle. (Pix to come) My ankle made a funny popping sound and hurt a lot. (No pix) I could barely walk, so I went to the ship's medical center. (Pix to come) The doctor diagnosed me with a dislocated peroneal tendon and injured ligaments. The tendon actually flops back and forth over my ankle bone. Jacob tagged along with me to the medical facility, and was so grossed out by the entire check up that he had the doctor laughing out loud at his squeamishness. The doctor wrapped my ankle (Pix to come) and advised me to see an orthopedic surgeon as soon as I arrive back home. Although it still hurts a bit, the ankle feels much better than it did two days ago, and I only walk with a slight limp now. Due to the injury, I had to cancel my Ziplining Tour because you are required to have to have full use of your legs, arms, hands, and feet. This was the excursion that I was quite nervous about in the first place. Jim told me that if I really did not want to go, I should have just said so, instead of resorting to such extreme measures. He and Adam did "zipline" (Pix to come) and had a great time.

We also came in first place in the ship's "Week-long Mega Scavenger Hunt." We had to gather 28 trinkets, obtain 20 crew member signatures (Jacob's specialty - he will talk to anyone), and answer 20 questions. We won tote bags, more hats, luggage tags, and travel document holders. It has certainly been a prize-winning week for us! Now where do we pack it all?

Satellite Internet Service Leaves Something to be Desired

I intended to post some pictures tonight, but the satellite internet service on the ship keeps going in and out. I hope the signal will work better tomorrow, so I can upload the photos. We have had lots of exciting escapades, including a bear sighting, a dog sled ride, a broken toilet (glad we have two!), and a visit to the onboard medical facility (for me - don't worry, though, nothing serious). Unfortunately, I will not be able to participate in the Ziplining Tour due to my "injury." I am going to hobble off to bed now and hope that our satellite signal will not be blocked by any mountains in the morning.

Glacier Bay

Today we sailed into Glacier Bay, Alaska. We witnessed the glaciers "calving," which means big chunks of ice broke off and fell into the ocean. It was pretty amazing. Jim saw some porpoises this afternoon, but I have yet to see any marine life. Unless you count the salmon and shrimp on Jim's dinner plate. Anyway, here are some recent photos.

A view of Glacier Bay.

Rico, our room steward, dropping off our free champagne.

More scenery.

Jacob in his Princess robe and slippers.

The Holland America Amsterdam cruising by.

Jim and Richie on the balcony.

Me on the balcony.

The white, icy-looking part at the bottom of the mountain is the glacier.

Ahoy!

I'll just post a quick update, as it is after midnight here on the ship. (4 a.m. at home) Our pricey drive from Anchorage to our cruise port went well on Saturday. The tunnel that connects Whittier, AK to the rest of the world was very creepy - dark, one lane, narrow, low, rock walls, etc. I was happy to see the light at the end! It was raining when we boarded the ship, but cleared up nicely by sailaway time.

Our suite is, quite simply, just awesome! It is everything I imagined it would be, and then some. It has a living room, two bedrooms, two huge closets, two bathrooms, and a balcony. Plus, we receive all kinds of suite amentities - MUCH more than we ever did in our Royal Caribbean suites. I *double heart* Princess. Included is free internet, so here I sit.

Today we were at sea all day. We were supposed to cruise past the "College Fjords" in the morning, but the fog was so thick, and the ice chunks were so numerous, that the captain turned the ship around and headed from the bay back into the Pacific. One interesting thing while traveling through fog on a vessel, is the mandatory use of the foghorn. For hours, we heard the deep, loud "WOOOO" of the horn every two minutes; like clockwork. In the afternoon, the five of us entered a Scavenger Hunt and won first place. We are now the proud owners of Princess hats. Jacob has spent more time than he usually does in the Kids' Club, and I met up today with some people that I had been conversing with on a cruise website. Everyone else that we speak with on the ship has been lucky enough to see whales, porpoises, seals, and other sea life in the ocean. We have seen one otter. Well, maybe tomorrow!

I think that with Adam's and/or Richie's assistance, I will be able to figure out how to upload some pictures soon. For now I will sign off and get to sleep.

Bon Voyage

On Friday we went to the Alaskan Native Heritage Center in Anchorage. It was quite fascinating – much more so than we ever imagined. We are heading to our ship on Saturday afternoon. The sixty mile journey to the port takes about two hours, and goes along winding mountain roads and through the longest railway & highway tunnel in North America. I arranged transportation with a van shuttle service for $265.50 (Yikes!), which, believe it or not, is $125.00 cheaper than the Princess shuttle bus would have been. Just another example of price gouging in Alaska. On the flip side, our 150 mile, four-hour Amtrak trip next week from Vancouver to Seattle cost only $110.00 for the five of us.

Here are some webcam links for anyone who would like to see our locations as we proceed on our voyage.

This is the webcam that is situated on our ship. Sometimes the view is straight off our bow, other times it is positioned looking backwards towards the stern.
http://www.princess.com/bridgecams/sa/sapphire_bridgecam.html

Whittier - This is the port city where our cruise begins.
http://whittierak.yukontel.com/

Skagway – We will be here on Tuesday.
http://www.weather-forecast.com/locations/Skagway/webcams/801

Juneau – We will be here on Wednesday.
http://www.juneau.org/cam/southcam.php

Ketchikan – We will be here on Thursday. http://www.earthcam.com/usa/alaska/ketchikan/

Vancouver – Our cruise ends here on Saturday, the 31st. http://www.vancouver.com/webcam/index.html

As soon as we have some captivating photos, I will post them. All five of us have adjusted just fine to the 4 hour time difference and to the “midnight sun” glowing throughout the night. The temperatures have been in the 50s and 60s, and are expected to be in the 70s as we cruise south from here.

In Pursuit of Mt. McKinley and Fish

We drove to Anchorage from Denali Thursday afternoon. Enroute, we attempted to click a few pictures of Mt. McKinley. Each time we pulled over to snap some photos, there were clouds shrouding the top 5,000 feet or so of the mountain. Evidently, that is a fairly common occurrence. It certainly was the case whenever we wanted to photograph the summit. Then, when we arrived back in Anchorage, I convinced everyone that we should stop at a park alongside a river where I had heard that large numbers of salmon were running. While the actual waterway was nice, it was across the street from some train tracks and a dingy industrial area. Of course, there were no fish in the creek, either. The boys ridiculed me relentlessly about dragging them to an alleged salmon preserve, only to see vacant buildings and burned-out automobiles instead of abundant schools of fish. Nature at its finest.

Anyway, here are some pictures from the past few days. Tomorrow I will post the webcam links for our ship and for the ports we will be visiting, lest anyone is remotely interested in taking a look at those. By the way, we have not seen darkness since we were back in Michigan. The sun did not set while we were up at Denali, and it is still daylight here in Anchorage at 11:00 p.m.

The scenery flying into Anchorage.

Our cabin at Denali.

A Dall Sheep poised and ready to charge at us.

I liked this sign.

Our rental van, with the elusive Mt. McKinley in the background.

Mt. McKinley - just imagine that the clouds behind Adam are not there.

The Last Frontier

We arrived in Alaska right on schedule Tuesday afternoon. The scenery flying into Anchorage was absolutely spectacular! The mountains here, in my opinion, are even more beautiful than the Rockies or the Alps. We picked up our rental van and began the four hour drive to Denali National Park. As we were cruising down the highway on the outskirts of Anchorage, we saw a moose just moseying down the side of the highway. Weird. When we got close to Denali, we stopped at a small grocery store to pick up some snacks. We were stunned when Jacob’s bag of Doritos rang up at $8.89! We double checked the charge with the clerk and were assured that it was indeed correct. They were promptly returned to the shelf. Welcome to Alaska! Land of high prices.

We pulled into our cabin around 9:00 p.m. ADT. (1:00 a.m. EDT) I was exhausted! In the 40 hours prior to our arrival, I had logged a total of 3 hours of sleep. While our cabin is gorgeous, it lacks two very important things. A television and the INTERNET. How uncivilized! I will be able to post pictures, as promised, when we return to Anchorage on Thursday night.

P.S. Princess Cruises just called to see if we wanted to accept a complimentary upgrade from our two oceanview rooms to a two-room balcony suite. I *heart* Princess.

The TV Critic

Recently I participated in yet another online survey, this one concerning television. I was selected to critique a concept children’s tv program, provided that "my 7-to-14-year-old boy" was also available to watch and offer his opinions regarding the show. The research company sent a top-secret DVD to our house for us to view and evaluate. Jake and I watched it together and thought it was HILARIOUS. Afterwards, Jacob dutifully completed and submitted the internet survey and will be compensated $5.00 for his troubles. We are not supposed to discuss the contents of the episode with anyone, apparently so none of our many highfalutin tv producer friends will steal the idea and make it into their own blockbuster series. I have to mail the DVD back, but Jacob and I both hope that the program will actually make it onto television. It deals with a subject close to Jacob’s heart, so any of you who know him can probably guess the topic. Wish we could talk more about it, but our lips are sealed! And don’t offer Jacob any bribes, either, because he can easily be bought.

I also want to add that a few weeks ago, I did receive a reimbursement check for my secret shopper dinner last month. With all the extra money we are raking in, Jim will soon be able to quit his job.

Off to Alaska

Next week, we are going to Alaska. We will spend some time at Denali National Park gazing at Mt. McKinley and then hang around Anchorage for a couple of days. On Saturday, the 24th, we will board a ship for a weeklong cruise to Vancouver. After that, we are traveling to Seattle by train, where we will sightsee before flying home again. The only reason Jim agreed to this trip is that I was fortunate enough (or, if I do say so myself, shrewd enough) to secure an unbelievably inexpensive cruise deal six months ago. I was also able to reserve frequent flyer seats for our flights. Cruising Alaska in May is about half the price of going in June, July, or August. Seriously, it is about half the price. So, the four of us and Richie will set off to the great, white north, where, incidentally, they still have snow on the ground in many places, including our cruise departure city. As long as Adam’s laptop cooperates, I will attempt to keep the blog updated with pictures and posts of our adventures. I am excited, yet very, very nervous, about a ziplining tour we have booked in Ketchikan, Alaska. Check it out here: http://www.alaskacanopy.com I cannot believe that I actually signed up for this – hurtling through the treetops in the Alaskan Rainforest (yes, there is a rainforest in Alaska. . .) suspended by a wire cable. It was all my idea, too. What in the world was I thinking?

More Geocaching

Eric’s girlfriend, Annie, generously loaned me her GPS unit the other day. We have had a great time playing with it at our house this week. I was especially amused to see Adam running around the yard with it in his hand on Tuesday night. He justified his scurrying about by explaining that the unit has to be moving at 3 m.p.h. or faster in order for the coordinates to update. He looked funny because, as a rule, Adam does not run. Ever. Anyway, Jacob and I rode our bikes back to the alleged location of our neighborhood geocache yesterday – this time armed with an honest-to-goodness GPS. We felt hopeful and positive. We bumped along the dirt trail to the secluded spot, parked our bicycles next to the creek, and revved up our secret weapon. The latitude and longitude coordinates on the GPS matched those from the geocaching website. Jake and I searched every nearby nook and cranny for any type of small container. We searched every tree and stump. We looked high. We looked low. We came up empty. The person who hid this particular cache lives in the house that backs up to this trail. He wrote online that it is entertaining for his family to watch people hunt for the film canister. I find that part a little bit creepy. I stayed out of the guy's backyard, but I now firmly believe that the cache is in the public easement closer to his property line than the concealed trail. And since I am skittish about having this family spy on me while I look for their cache, I should probably just give up this hobby. Or at least stick to searches in more public places, like parks, for example. Not that I am any better at finding caches in parks.

Up-to-Date Mother-in-Law News

My mother-in-law, Bev, has been driving around town ever since Debbie returned her car keys to her in March. On Sunday, Bev called my cell phone in a panic with the news that she had scratched her Buick while backing into a parking space at the Bingo Hall. Apparently, the car in the adjacent spot was, in her opinion, “too close to the lines,” and, gee, she did not realize that she was pulling in crooked, either. So, instead of straightening out, or compensating for the fact that the other vehicle was not exactly centered in the next space, Bev just rammed into it, scraping it up pretty badly. (Over $1,000 worth of damage, we learned yesterday.) Oddly enough, Bev admitted that there were only three or four other cars in the whole parking lot at the time, but she chose to squeeze in between two of them. Her previous accident, in January, was also in a Bingo Hall parking lot. A few months prior to that, she simply slammed into another vehicle while changing lanes as she drove down the street. She has had three accidents in the past 6 months, and, interestingly, she did not even have her keys for 6 weeks during that time period. So, three crashes in 4 ½ months of driving, average out to about one every 5 weeks. I don’t know what one’s accident percentage should be before one’s license gets revoked, but I will certainly steer clear of her banged-up Buick if I ever see it cruising down the road.

On the medical front, Bev is smoking, but offsets that by using her oxygen. Sometimes simultaneously. She told me that she went to a doctor appointment Monday for a test, but the receptionist informed her that she had already been in for the test last week. Bev didn’t remember. When I inquired about the nature of the test, she did not recall the name of it, or why she needed it. She has also been phoning me regularly with the same questions over and over again. And, when I spoke to her today, she thought it was July. It all gets a little old sometimes, but what can you do?

The Fishing Derby

Each year, our township sponsors a Fishing Derby on the first Saturday in May. The pond in our local park is stocked with 1,500 rainbow trout, and from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. you can fish ‘til your heart’s content. Or until you catch three fish – whichever comes first. I don’t mind the idea of fishing as a hobby, but our pond is usually an unrealistic and putrid shade of greenish-blue, and I would never dream of eating a fish from there. Well, I don’t like to clean fish, or eat fish, either, so I have always been a huge fan of just throwing back anything that is hooked. I blame Jacob’s newfound passionate interest in fishing on my nephew, Carey, who is a professional fisherman on the east coast. Carey took Jacob fishing last spring and guaranteed him that he would catch a fish. He made good on the promise. I have taken Jacob fishing at least 10 times since then and he has not had as much as a nibble. Even at the Fishing Derby last May, Jacob never had a bite, despite the fact that there were allegedly hundreds of hungry trout swimming in the pond.

The 2008 Fishing Derby was held yesterday. We got an early start, hoping to have first dibs on the stockpile of aquatic critters. After an hour of casting his line, not only did Jacob not have a fish yet, but very few people around us had caught anything, either. So where were all of these trout anyway? We stayed for another half hour, then took a break to go have breakfast. After eating, we returned to the pond to try again. Ninety minutes later, Jacob still had not snagged a thing – not even a stick or weed. Needless to say, Jacob is a bit disillusioned with this whole fishing business, but says he will go back to the park today to use up the rest of his worm supply. I really hope he will catch something so we can at least click a few photos and, if nothing else, prove to Carey that we are worthy anglers.

The water is now murky gray, not greenish-blue anymore.