Alaska Cruise – 2025

Day One, Seattle

Weather:  75° and sunny.

On Friday, May 30, we departed from Seattle pier 91 at the base of Magnolia in bright sunshine. As we embarked, we accidentally followed some people into the exclusive Reserve, an area on the 16th floor right in the front of the ship that you were supposed to pay extra for.  We experienced the embarkation from there.

After getting acquainted with the ship, we ran into Rick and Carol at the Sunset bar, at the ships aft (back). We dined at the Tuscan restaurant and had the first of many delicious meals. At 9 PM we attended the Joe Yannetty comedy show in the theater.  He worked the crowd and was pretty funny.  You didn't want to sit in the first row.  He made the first evening very enjoyable.

Day Two, at Sea

Weather:  50°, cloudy and windy.

On Saturday, May 31, We spent the entire day at sea.

The ship was rocking a little bit, but it was fine. Karen and I walked the track on deck 15 for about 45 minutes and then we had a delicious breakfast in the Oceanview cafe on deck 14, which we did almost every day after that. They had scrambled eggs, hashbrowns made to order omelettes, waffles, fruit, pastries, just about everything you can imagine.

We listened to a lecture about whales given by Samantha Olson at 10am, Ed and I attended a metabolism class in the morning and I took a sketch class in the afternoon. I penciled out an elephant. Karen and Betty played cribbage in the lounge. For dinner we ate at the Cosmopolitan and afterwards we attended the evening show with the celebrity edge cast Kaleidoscope.

Day Three, June 1, Ketchikan

Weather:  55°, partly cloudy and windy.

In the morning after breakfast, we walked around town, by a strange coincidence, walked into a yarn shop and met the niece of Pat Kristovich, an old family friend of Karen's parents.  We were reminded of how many jewelry shops there were at Alaskan cruise ports.  So many!

At 11 am we attended the Great Alaskan Lumberjack show with Ed & Betty. The weather was windy and chilly but not bad.

We had lunch on board at the Cosmopolitan, dinner at the Cypress.  After dinner we watched an amazing musician named Kuba Kawnik, a multi-instrumentalist who played a couple of very unique instruments.  One is called a Vibraphone, which is like a Zylophone except with metal keys instead of wood.  The other was a "touchless instrument" called a theremine.

Day Four, June 2, Juneau

Weather:  50° and light rain.

I woke up at 3:30am and looked outside.  It was light out!   I noticed that we were sharing the frigid waters with a lot of little floating icebergs.  Went back to bed, then got back up at 6am, went outside at 6:30am.

We were getting closer to the Endicott Glacier! The scenery was spectacular! The ship pivoted a couple of times so that you could view the glacier from all sides. Karen stayed in the room and watched from there.

Once we arrived in Juneau, we took a shuttle into town to the public library where our rental car was parked. We drove to the Mendenhall glacier and took the two mile walk to Nugget Falls.  The force of the falls produced its own wind! Amazing! After spending time at the glacier, we went to a fish hatchery, and then took the Goldbelt Tram to the top of Mount Roberts. It was a little scary at first, but the views were spectacular and made it worth it. This was our busiest day.

Interesting fact about the capital city of Juneau.  The city goes from sea level to 3,800 feet in elevation, peaking out at the top of Mt. Roberts.  It can be accessed only by boat or plane, not by car!

Back on board, we ate dinner at the Normandy, then met up with Rick and Carol and listened to the jazz group Blue Ocean.  They played Brazilian Bosa Nova music which I love.

Day Five, June 3, Skagway, 50°

Weather:  50°, mostly sunny, very windy

After breakfast I worked out at the gym with Ed before we walked the town. We had delicious pastries and coffee at a little bakery called Lucy's.

Later, we discovered that Ed had lost his Celebrity Sea Pass card to let him back onto the ship.  He went back to Lucy's and fortunately, they had it there.  He said his heart was racing!

We ate dinner at the Cosmopolitan that night with Rick and Carol. After dinner, watched the Funk show, then saw Zeus and Matthias in the Eden lounge.

Day Six, June 4, at Sea

Weather:  50°, mostly cloudy and windy.

We had a continental breakfast in our room, as we had done on a couple of other occasions, then went on the ship tour excursion.

We got security checked with the wand prior to the tour.  Wisely, they were very careful about security.

During the tour we saw the food preparation area, laundry, storage, ironing (175 degrees machine), recycling, the power center, the bridge where they navigate from. The ship uses reverse osmosis to turn saltwater into freshwater.

One of the engineers joked that, "It's so good, we bottle it and sell it to Carnival!"

We learned some interesting statistics. The ship produces 55 watts, enough to power up to 36,000 homes. Top speed is 24 knots (28 mph), although they usually travel between 18 and 22 knots. They use 12,000 pounds of flour and 450 pounds of sugar per day.  The ships holds 3000 passengers and 1200 staff on board. Laundry runs 24 hours per day.  The captain and chief engineers are Greek, because the original company was Greek owned before they sold to Royal Caribbean. The bridge had two lookouts vigilantly watching the sea at all times, 24/7.

At night, we went to the Savanah Smith show in the theatre.  She was energetic and had an amazing voice. She sang Blue Bayou by Linda Ronstadt and Fields of Gold by Sting, among others. What a performer!

Day Seven, June 5, Victoria

Weather:  55° and foggy with zero visibility most of the day, but when we got close to Victoria, the fog lifted and we had a gorgeous 75 - 80º day.

The cruise ship didn’t arrive in Victoria until 4:30 PM, so we had all day to hang out by the pool. It was a fabulous day, I even got sunburnt. We had lunch outside the Oceanview Café with Ed & Betty, then played cribbage. The four of us took a taxi to Butchart Gardens and arrived there at 6:30 PM.   We paid the taxi driver extra to wait for us and give us a ride back, $150 total for the four of us.

Butchart Gardens was beautiful, as you can imagine. The photos don’t tell the whole story. We arrived back in time to have dinner at the Cosmopolitan and then watched Savannah Smith again, in the Club this time.

Day Eight, June 6

Weather:  68° and sunny as we disembarked, warmed up to mid-70s.

We woke up early and ran into Rick and Carol at the Oceanview cafe, had breakfast with them before disembarking around 8am.

Overall, it was a good trip. The weather cooperated, mild temperatures and no rain, except in Juneau. I thought the food was very good, as was the entertainment.

Fun to see Alaska again and be reminded of why they call it the last frontier!