PandaBear62

The mine tour from Juneau. I don’t have any of us planning for gold.

Day 5: Juneau, Alaska We were up early today for Juneau. We had a car rental through Juneau Car Rentals. It’s been somewhat a comedy of errors with this. They no longer have their lot near AJ dock, so have been making do in terms of car pick up. I received a text the day before the my credit card was declined and realized they had my old number from a card that was compromised. We texted and got that straightened out. We were “upgraded” to a 12 passenger van, which was not an upgrade for us, as we wanted a conventional minivan but this was our only option. So we made do. For those who may not be aware, this is not Avis or National….our van had over 150,000 miles with scratches and paint missing. It ran fine and we got where we needed to go, but it wasn’t pretty! I had already explained this to our group, but they were still a little surprised. We docked right near the tram, so got off the ship and it was a very short walk to Taku fisheries where our car was parked. We were on the road by about 8:15 to Mendenhall Glacier. We went to the visitor center and made the hike to Nugget Falls. It’s two miles round trip. During the hike there is a plaque in memory of Romeo (https://protectallwildlifeblog.com/2019/11/08/a-tragic-wolf-called-romeo-loved-too-much-and-he-deserved-better/) After Mendenhall glacier we drove to the Alaskan Brewing company and had some beer and food from a food truck (Wild Alaskan). The brewery opens at 11 as does the Wild Alaskan food truck (which isn’t really a truck, it’s permanent ). The pizza truck doesn’t open until 12, so we missed that. We then headed to the Goodbelt tram, where we picked up our tour of the AJ mine. This was chosen by one of the guys in our group. It wouldn’t be my first choice, but he really enjoyed it and I think the kids in the group did too. This tour is offered by the ship but we booked directly with the company. We parked the car at the marine parking lot (which is where we dropped off the car too) and went to the Red Dog Saloon. Our friends live near a town that also has a Red Dog Saloon (no relation) so we had to go there. We listened to music a bit and then back to the ship. I had noticed last night when we got our patter that Don Friesan was the comedian in the theatre. My husband really likes him so we wanted to make that show. So I napped for 45 minutes and then headed to the show. He was funny and he’s a “clean” comedian. He has one more show the second tk last night and we plan to go to that as well. We then headed up to the Adagio lounge and enjoyed a couple of drinks and played cards. The lounge has last call by 10, so we finished our drinks and headed to the International Cafe for a sandwich while some others headed to the casino.

Dinner in Main Dining room day 5

Day 5 Glacier Bay patters

Dining room day 4 Icy Strait Point

We’ve been up there multiple nights and no music.

Patters Day 4

Day 4: Icy Strait Point, Alaska (WLD Dock) I am realizing I am just so tired on this trip….is it the fresh air? I didn’t have the best night (I have insomnia) but dragged myself out of bed so I could go to Tess’ presentation in glaciers. She is definitely quirky and wouldn’t be everyone’s cup of tea but I have enjoyed her. Sadly, I felt the glacier presentation really missed the mark. It was kind of “all over the place”. We then went to play Bingo and once again, didn’t win. But we continue to get closer. People around us won for the second time…..what???? Why not us! I went to the buffet for the first time for lunch. We wandered around outside for awhile and then back to the room for a little rest and getting ready for our Wildlife excursion in Icy Strait Point. It was quite disorganized getting out for our tour. There were three tours leaving at different times but that was never mentioned. So people were in wrong groups and had to leave the bus because the tickets weren’t checked when people boarded. But, we took off and made the drive to a boardwalk area. The tour said there was a walk of 800 yards, which seems about right. Unfortunately, our wildlife sightings were very limited, so my opinion of the tour was rather poor. But that’s how it goes. We bought donuts at the stand ($7 for a dozen and you can choose 2 flavors). Then we went to a bar right near the donut stand and had a drink. We hit the shops and then took the gondola up to the ship. We just went to the buffet for dinner because we didn’t want two hours in the dining room. I ate, stopped by a bar on the way to room for an amaretto nightcap and headed to bed

I apologize for the delay in answering this, but wanted to have more experience with the package before I did. Keep in mind, I’m not super picky and don’t have specific liquors I want to drink. The wines choices were most confusing, as there were wines not available on the menu and wines that were available that weren’t on the menu. But there were always multiple choices and we were given the specific wine (winery). We were able to have all the mixed drinks we wanted with the plus passage and most of the specialty ones at Adagio. I never felt we were limited. Draft beer was limited but they did have bottles. I only had beer the first day or two because we were enjoying all the mixed drinks. The regular package worked fine for us and I’m glad we didn’t upgrade. I do have dinner at Sabatinis tonight and may decide to try a more expensive wine and pay the difference, as a treat.

I’m a little behind, as we have been busy! Day 3 Thank goodness for alarms….I set my phone to go off otherwise I would have slept late again. Maybe it’s because the room is so much darker than home and that lovely motion of the boat. I made it time for the first naturalist presentation at 9;15 with Tess and then headed to the piazza after at 10 to see Kelly White, who is doing the totem carving. I left to see the “Master Hair Class” at 11:30 in the spa. I only went because they were giving away a free haircut and I need a haircut! Of course, it was basically a sell for their products, which I was expecting, but they didn’t even give away the haircut. I shouldn’t have been surprised, because I also got a manicure the first day and was supposed to receive a free paragon treatment and didn’t get that either. Despite this, I did book a haircut, because I really needed one and price wise, at $79, it’s only about $19 more than I typically pay. They were really booked and had almost nothing available so I took the appointment today at 6:15 when I was promised I’d be ready for our dinner reservation at 7:20. Fingers crossed! I should also add at this point, one advantage of living in a really HCOL area is prices don’t seem so high when you are on vacation (have to find the benefits where I can). I then made my way back to the piazza for lunch at the cafe and then headed back to the theatre for the second presentation by Tess. As an aside, I love all the Alaska presentations. I will probably attend most of them. Following this, it was Bingo which Kathy and I again didn’t win, but we had fun. We are alternating buying a $39 pack and decided to share any winnings. We made our way back to our respective rooms by way of getting app support and trying to change around our Sabatini reservation, with a final stop for ice cream. After a very short rest, I got ready for dinner and headed out to my hair appointment. I arrived a few minutes early in case they were ready early, but that was not to be.

There wasn’t music last night. I will let you know if we’re they’re again and hear any!

Day 3 is the first formal night. Here are the menus:

The patters didn’t seem to load on my previous post (or at least it’s not showing up on my phone) so trying again.

Patters for Day 3

day 2 At sea I had been saying yesterday how really tired I was. Like exhausted. Very atypical for me. I woke up about 6 or 7 and went back to bed. About 8ish I heard my dh in the shower and figured I get up when he got out. Nope, I fell back asleep. That’s a long way of saying I didn’t wake up until 11am. So I went to the international cafe and had a coffee and then a small lunch there: a roast beef sandwich on a baguette, some shrimp noodle salad and a lemon cookie. It was yummy and I am pretty sure it will become a lunch favorite location. I get overwhelmed by all of the choices at the buffet and like the smallness of the cafe. Kathy and I made our way to the Princess theatre to see the Whales of Alaska presentation by Tess Juliana. It was good. We then headed to a lounge (Club Fusion) for Bingo. $39 for 6 cards for 4 games plus a scratcher (but not a winner, sigh). We had a terrible time getting the attention of a server to order a drink, so I finally just got up and asked someone to come over. I’m not shy I guess! No surprises, we weren’t even close to winning. Like someone won and the best we had was 2 in a row! We walked up to Sabatinis to see if we could switch around our reservation but no one was there. We’ll go tonight. We then headed to the International Cafe for a little snack to hold us until dinner I headed back to my room and ended up napping! We headed out for dinner. I had the Caesar salad, prime rib and ice cream for dessert. I was pleasantly surprised with the prime rib. So many places serve it wigh so much fat, you can’t eat it. This has a little bit not too much. The ice cream was excellent. After dinner my friends Kathy and Jan went to Adagios and played cards and had a drink. We had planned to talk about changing around our dinner at Savatinis and I remembered the speciality dining was just every other night. But that’s okay because we discovered Adagios. What a lovely bar. We’re thinking this could be a good place for viewing in Glacier Bay day. When it closed, I headed back to the room for the night. Tomorrow: another sea day.

I tried to post this last night, but the internet was too inconsistent. We stayed at Vines awhile and then made a quick trip to the room. Our friends were at the Salty Dog eating so we joined them. The Captain announced a delay in departing. They are expecting maybe 8pm. Something maybe about provisions arriving late? I went to the spa to schedule a manicure. They were quite booked the next two days (both sea days). I was offered an 8am appointment…..no thank you! But they then said I could do it right then and that worked. Pricey, of course, but I knew that going in. But a nice manicure. I also discovered my app really wasn’t working. Not the usual the app is slow and crappy but the “app has lost all my info and won’t let me add it in again” problem. So we added a trip to guest services to figure that out, and now it seems to be working better. We ended up at dinner in the DaVinci room. We were told that we really should make reservations, rather than walking up. So I guess we’ll try. Our group is not “foodies”, so take my comments with that grain of salt. I also am bad at remembering to take photos. Here is the menu from the first night: I included the list of wines for the beverage package. We didn’t drink tonight….we had already had a few drinks and after a long day I just didn’t want more. So I’ll report later if the list is accurate. I had the garlic shrimp, which I enjoyed, and the risottto which was really good. For dessert, the soufflé. I’m not usually a fan of soufflé, but I ordered it because of the amaretto sauce. It was really good. The chocolate was light, not a heavy chocolate flavor….just yummy. No pictures except the risotto My husband went to the casino but I went back to the room for bed….I was tired. Couple of thoughts: We were told there were 3000 passengers aboard this cruise. Our room is nice (L103)-an obstructed ocean view. My husband likes a room with natural light. Good closet space. But, virtually no outlets! Tune in tomorrow for more!

correction: we ate at the Salty Dog Grill. I think the Iguana Grill is Carnival. After lunch we went to the muster station and checked in and then saw the spa. I plan to get a manicure and apparently if you book today you get a bonus. For the manicure it’s a paraffin treatment and a massage you get the longer one for the cheaper price. We then headed to Vines and sat by the window with a view of the Bay Bridge. I’d post the wine list but apparently it’s not accurate. The server noted he didn’t have wines that were listed and he had others not on the list. So you really have to ask. Lovely view of the Bay Bridge.

Day 1: San Francisco I got up this morning and ran around doing last minute tasks until we left to pick up my girlfriend and drive up to San Francisco. We decided to go to the pier and drop off my friend Kathy and I with the luggage and have dh then go to the parking garage. Huge mistake. The Embarcadero was so amazingly crowded and it took us over 30 minutes to drive the short distance to the pier. We are planning a Hawaiian cruise also out of SF and will go straight to the parking garage and walk our luggage the block or two. We dropped off the luggage easily and got in line. I thought the line w as long….at 11:30 it was basically at the sign for Pier 23 By 12:30 we were nearing the entrance to check in and the line had just about doubled. It looped back to the terminal. I’m not sure these pictures really show the true picture of how long the line is. There was a representative from Princess circulating around and he acknowledged that they were not enforcing at all the arrival times we signed up for. At 12:40 we were in the building, through security and in line for the next check in. At 1, we were on the ship. Yay!! I’m curious how long it will take our friends to board…..they joined the line about 12:30. Our room was available, so we dropped off a couple of things and headed up to the lido deck. We then went to have lunch at the Iguana Grill, which dh wanted. I had a sweet potato and black bean street taco which I enjoyed. Patter for today:

This cruise is rescheduled from 2020. We were planning on sailing from San Francisco to Alaska with another couple.. When we rescheduled, we ended up on this same cruise, but added another girlfriend and another couple. So now we have 7. There are lots of sea days on this trip, and we look forward to relaxing, playing cards, Code Names (we love that game!), etc, as well as the port days. My dh and I have previously sailed Princess from Vancouver, and then took a land tour. That was great, but the airfare to Vancouver and out of Anchorage, plus the extra time we spent in Vancouver made for a pricey trip. Because we are close to the San Francisco port, driving in and parking was a much better budget choice. I am trying to keep this cruise from being a budget buster for our friends. And given how bad airline travel is right now, I was really glad not to be facing a flight. Coordinating excursions for a group can be difficult at times and our group was no exception. We ended up with the following: Icy Strait Point: Some of us are on a ship excursion (Bears) and others plan to just walk around. Ketchikan: We have a car rental (mini van). We booked tickets to see the Lumberjack show and then will drive out to Totem Bight park. Juneau: Another van rental. We will pick up the car and drive out to Mendenhall Glacier. We then come back, park and have tickets for the Gaustinea mine. If the weather is nice, we’ll take the tram. If not, maybe the state museum. Prince Rupert: This was a change from Victoria. Since we were in Victoria 6am-noon, we couldn't’ do much anyway so this change wasn’t an issue. We decided against an excursion here, primarily due to cost and distance. For example, the Wilderness Jetboat Adventure is $309 and 5 hours. But the jetboat adventure part is 35 minutes, a hike is 30 and a dinner is 60 minutes. The other 3 hours was travel time. So instead we plan to walk to the city museum and have a drink at the Crest hotel. I looked into options for getting to the terminal, as we are somewhat local. A limousine was considered, but we ended up booking parking at the pier. Two cars for the 10 days was about $400. We would have needed a Mercedes sprinter to handle our group size and luggage, which required a 4 hour minimum, so would have been over $1000 both ways. This is the first cruise I’ve been on where we are local, so I am excited about not having to travel both ways. This is our itinerary. There are lots of “at sea” days and that is okay with us. We plan to relax, play cards, play games, drink and just generally enjoy our time with each other. I will admit I am a little nervous about this cruise. I’ve heard such negative things on these boards about Princess and it’s such a big deal for me that my friends enjoy this trip! Packing If you have no interest in packing, just skip this part. I am typically someone who packs a 21” carry on roller and a personal item tote. For this trip, we were driving to the port, so I could realistically bring whatever I wanted. However, I know myself, and I don’t like being overwhelmed by clothing choices when I travel. I also don’t mind doing a quick load of laundry, especially with a cruise with as many sea days as this one. While I adore dresses for warm weather trips, I didn’t take any on this trip, with the exception of one as a coverup for my swim suit (not sure if I’ll use the Enclave or hot tub, but want to be prepared in case I do). My bags were a Travelpro rolling carryon and a Kipling Sasha tote. Bottoms: 1 pair black ponte knit slacks 1 pair floral pants (black and navy) 1 pair of black joggers 1 pair of black and white lightweight pinstripe pants 1 pair dressy black pants Tops black and white stripe long sleeve tunic Black and white polka dot ¾ sleeve blouse Blue and black sleeveless floral sleeveless blouse Red short sleeve swing tee Blue short sleeve swing tee Black ¾ sleeve swing tee Gray ¾ sleeve tee Royal blue short sleeve tee 2 “dressy” tops (one in varied blue tones and one with green and black shades) Misc Clothes Swim suit swim cover up Underwear Bras socks Cold weather clothes Soft fleece like gaiter Magic gloves Black pashmina 2 pairs black tights 2 under tees (performance wear) Outerwear Black very lightweight ¾ sleeve open cardigan Lightweight windbreaker with hood A down jacket (not that great of quality, but used it on last Alaskan cruise) black ponte knit casual blazer Shoes Sneakers May jane style sneakers Arch support slip on shoes (think skechers style) Dress flats Misc iPad mini Kindle Electronics cords and chargers Games (Code names, cards, Left Right center) Toiletries Umbrellas OTC meds such as bonine, ibuprofen, etc