On the completion of land portion of Denali Discovery Cruisetour we
boarded the ship Norwegian Sun at Whittier around 6.00 pm with our
hand-luggage, after completing all custom formalities. Our main luggage was delivered directly from
the coach to our stateroom by the tour company.
Our stateroom was one with balcony in 9th deck. It was
comfortable and roomy and the balcony plus long hours of sunlight helped us to
enjoy the scenic passage even beyond 9 pm. The first job we did was to explore the complimentary
dining options. We decided on Garden
cafe and Great outdoor in deck 11 and we were not disappointed. Not only we had good vegetarian options but
there was rice and one Indian side dish every day, for lunch as well as dinner. And we
could also get plain curd morning and evening from an obliging chef, who
incidentally was from Australia. Further
in Deck 11, there was a pizza/pasta station in operation in the afternoon,
which we used occasionally.
Among the passengers, we met a group of young
couples of south Indian origin, alumni of the same engineering college in
Coimbatore, now settled in various states of U.S. There was one other couple, Radha
and Ramji, who had been former residents of Western Sydney, now settled in
Texas. They had come as two families, the other that of Radha’s sister, Meera,
settled in Miami. We also met two
couples from Castle Hill, Sydney; Mr.& Mrs. Sukumar and Mr. & Mrs.
Raymond Pillay who had come together and also one Mr. Nagarajan, Koramangala,
Bangalore who had come with his daughter and her family settled in California. Running into one or the other of them one
time or other in one place or other, it was quite a fun. Though in the ship there was a variety of entertainments and shows, we had our eyes only for the excellent scenery of
glaciers, mountains, forests, waterfalls etc, which could be enjoyed from the
comfort of our balcony, and the long hours of sunlight and the pleasant climate
most of the days facilitated this lotus-eating laziness. Shows in Stardust
and trips to Deck 11 were the only distractions from the glacier-gazing.
Day 2 was all-cruise day. We cruised along Hubbard Glacier, one of the
big glaciers which are calving icebergs. Unlike cruise in open seas, here one
never gets tired of grand scenery of virgin nature. On day 3, the ship docked
in Icy Strait Point, at a distance away from the shore. The shore was reached through a tender from
the ship. We went on a whale and marine mammals cruise. We could see some
seals, otters and whales at a distance and were lucky enough to watch one whale
taking a dive close to the ship.
Binoculars were provided to us free to facilitate whale watching and
when a mammal was sighted, the ship halted and an announcement made and there
was running all over to get to a vantage point. As we took the afternoon cruise only, in the
morning we went on a shore walk and spent time exploring the pier.
The next day ship docked in
Juneau, capital of Alaska. Here we took an excursion to Mendenhall
glacier. The glacier is 12 miles long
and nearby is a waterfall, Nugget falls or Mendenhall Glacier falls. There is a trail leading to it and you can
watch it at close quarters. We decided
to do it first before taking the trail to the vicinity of Glacier. As we got there and were enjoying the
majestic falls, floating icebergs in the Mendenhall lake and distant view of
the glacier flowing into the lake, luck of good climate deserted us. The climate that has been wonderful so long
suddenly changed. It didn’t turn
cold or dark but it started drizzling lightly but continuously, and at times
heavily. So we beat a hasty retreat to
the visitor’s centre where we waited for the coach, enjoying only the distant
view of the Glacier from the cosy shelter of the centre. In the evening the
ship cruised through Tracy Arm Fjord and South Sawyer Glacier. Oh! what a
magnificent view of elevated glaciers, sheer rock falls and majestic mountains just
dropping into the sea flat, floating icebergs of all sizes and shapes, single
and in groups.
The drizzle continued to dog us the next day as well in Skagway. Braving
the continuous drizzle, we went on the shore excursion, the White Pass scenic
railway. While we were taking in the breathtaking panorama of mountains,
waterfalls, glaciers and gorges, as the train made the steep climb uphill, came the bad news
that due to continuous rains some boulders got dislodged and had landed
squarely on the track with the result the train before us was turning back and
that ours will also terminate midway, even before reaching the tunnel. Disappointed that we couldn’t do the journey
in full, we returned to receive back half the cost of excursion as a small
consolation for the interrupted excursion.
But the next day in
Ketchikan we could complete the Duck tour as the drizzle was light and sporadic
in the morning and turned a bit heavy only after we returned to the ship for
lunch finishing the morning tour. You can see Ketchikan by land and sea in this
amphibious vehicle that glides into the water smoothly and floats around the
harbour as effortlessly as it travels around the streets of Ketchikan.
Ketchikan is a small island town which is called the “Salmon Capital of the World”.
This is the last halt before the ship docks for disembarkation at Vancouver.
The next day morning for a time the cruising was not smooth and Rajam started developing motion sickness. Luckily it did not last long as the cruising became smooth soon and
the rest of the cruise along the Inside Passage
was fine and enjoyable as before. The next morning we disembarked in Vancouver
and moved over with our luggage to the pre-booked hotel, “Century Plaza Hotel
&Spa”. The photos of the cruise, I
have uploaded in the Flickr album “Alaska Cruise”:
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