It's Over!

I might like to live here, thanks.

I think we left off just after Juneau with the updates. The following day found us at Ketchikan, AK. The four of us took an afternoon cruise around Misty Fjords, where we saw (duh) fjords, humpback whales (ooooh!), and a few harbor seals (aaaah!). After that, we had one more day of sailing before our final destination: The Land of Canada.

Aaah, fjords!

They're fjordastic!

We flew out of Vancouver today to return to our normal lives after 2 weeks of cool weathered vacationiness. I got lucky and ended up being bumped from my Vancouver-Minneapolis-Atlanta flight in favor of a direct to Atlanta Delta flight. I got in a few hours early and everything!

Speaking of Vancouver, we had a nice stopover day there. What a lovely city! We had our final bus tour in the morning and then went to The Fish House in Stanley Park for dinner- very good!

Mutti enjoys Queen Elizabeth Park- for 15 minutes before being herded back onto a bus.

Vancouver! They have a bridge!

After 2 weeks of being herded to and fro by the Holland America folks, we eschewed the coach to the airport this morning and gladly paid for a cab. We all enjoyed not feeling like cattle for 15 minutes before entering the mind-numbing check-in and customs process at the airport. As Doodah is prone to say: "Moooo." We all made it home in one piece (pretty much- poor Mutti got food poisoning in Minneapolis, I hear), and I'm sure the Memphis Quinlens were just as shocked by the heat in their corner of the South as I was by Atlanta's. Yikes!

Thanks for reading, folks!

Penultimate post

I'm not saying this trip is over, I'm just saying, this trip is over.

Winding Down

Today we are sailing into Ketchikan for our last day ashore, and the plan is to take a boat tour of some misty fjords and stuff. Yesterday we took a float plane over the Juneau Icefield and up the Taku River- saw lots of glaciers from above and ate salmon and saw bears at the Taku Glacier Lodge. All enjoyed the afternoon.


Mmm . . . salmon!


Yum yum! Leftover salmon bits!

All of the places we have stopped have been surrounded by plenty of very beautiful scenery, but so far Haines has been my favorite stop. It reminded me a little of Queenstown, NZ, (only smaller, of course, and without quite as many adventure sport options) in spirit and landscape. I am told Ketchikan will be pretty cool as well. It's all enough to awaken a little wanderlust, and I wonder how many people who visit Alaska in the summer (when it's a pretty easy sell) come back to try and make it their home only to find it more inhospitable than they ever imagined.

We are eating quite well aboard the Zaandam, so we are trying to hit the gym on the ship as often as possible. Fortunately, the gym is at the upper, forward section of the ship with lots of windows, so anyone working out has a great view of wherever we are at the time. Some eagle-eyed treadmillers even spotted a couple of whales out in front of the ship the other day.

Our waiter at dinner each night, Sugeng, has been quite entertaining. He shows Addie multiple tricks, puzzles, and origami or napkin creations every night. Last night he told us a few stories about the wackadoos he has waited on who spend 22-65 days on board longer cruises- a lady who required her entire stateroom to be draped in white, another lady who had a separate state room for all of her luggage, a wacky old couple who dyed their hair to match the different dining room color schemes each night. People with a lot of money to spend are weird, it seems.

We will arrive in Vancouver at some point tomorrow night or Sunday morning, and from there we disembark to spend the day in Canadia before flying home. I had a dream about my cat last night- must mean I'm getting a little bit homesick!