Alaska Cruise

Its been a long time since I last write in this blog because I was busy preparing my long vacation with my friends to Alsaka Cruise , Canada and New York. We decided to have this vacation in the month of July.  Once the decision is made, we applied our US visa through the web for interview.  We were lucky that we could easily get our visa.  The next we have to apply our Canadian visa.  That took us only 1 week .  We spent the total of Rm720.00 for both the visas. Once our visas are done, we get hold of a travel agent to book for us the most economy air fare to Anchorage(Alaska) and fly back from New York. We left the air tickets part to the agents while Emily and me have to start searching for lodging for our long holiday. We booked all the hotels, inns, and lodge through hot wire.com and hotel.com, all the lodgings we booked were clean and pleasant, the most important is that most of the lodging we booked either in or near the city centre,esp the China towns. We had 2 nights in Anchorage, 3 nights in Vancouver, 3 nights in Kelowna, 3 nights in Banff, 2 nights in Toronto, 2 nights in Niagara Falls,( 2 nights in Atlantic City and 1 night in Washington City, tour included) 8 nights in New York in friends house.

We flew on the 7th of Sept by Eve airline of Taiwan, we have to do our transit at Taipei airport. By the time we reached Anchorage it was 11.45pm the same day(7th) we gain 1 day.  We were fortunate that The America Best Value Inn that we booked provide free transport to and from the airport.

This is the America Best Value Inn where we stayed for 2 nights in Anchorage with the spacious airport van. Though it is a small inn, but very comfortable with breakfast included and very convenient because it is situated midway  between the city and the airport.

We took a cab to downtown the next morning, we wondered around the small town. Visited the visitor centre to gather information of Anchorage but unfortunately most of the places of interest were either close for the falls season or too far reach for us.  Thus we just hang around in the town for the day.      

This is one of the corner of Anchorage, quite with only few cars. Since there is nothing much we can do in Anchorage, we had our good rest before we  board the cruise the nest day.

We booked a coach that took us about 3 hours from Anchorage to Seward where we board our cruise.

Check in at the port to board the cruise

This is the cruise Radiance of the Sea(one of the Caribbean Cruise) before board into the ship at the dock.

The swimming pools of the cruise

The handcrafts of fruits at the entrance of the restaurant

The lobby of the cruise

The casino in the cruise 

After 1 whole night of sailing, our ship reached The Hubbard Glacier. We were given 1/2 hour to take as many pictures as possible.

The colours of the glacier is due to the different kind of sediments in the ice.

 We have the chance to see the falling of blocks of ice from the glacier and floating and melting in the cold sea.

 Dued to the global warming, the glacier has becoming smaller, see the big junk of ice melting in this ocean and flow to the other parts of world.

Outside the main dining hall(Cascades)

 Prawns and scallops

 Baked salmon.

The foods were so delicious that made me forget to take pictures of the soup and the desserts.

We sailed for another night.  Our first of call is Juneau.  We joined a 1/2 day offshore excursion to Mendenhall Glacier.

 It is just another glacier as Hubbard Glacier.  Here we can walk around to see the different angles and different views of the glacier.'.from flat land and go up hill to look down at the glacier.

 Views from the hill.

 We saw a wild bear by the stream looking for food.

 Some salmons in the clear water stream.

We were drop off in Juneau town after the 1/2 day tour.



 Our ship by the dock at Juneau.

Skagway is our second port of call.  It is a small cowboy mining town, and is now a tourist centre. Its just about 15 minutes walk from the dock.

 Skagway, view from our ship.

From Skagway, we sail for another night and reached our 3rd port of call, Icy Strait Point.  Here our ship have to dock quite a distance from the port because the water was too shallow for her.  Some motor boats send us to and fro from the ship to the port.

Full view of our cruise ship from the port.

 The jetty.

 From the jetty, we boarded a bus , about 5 minutes ride to this Red Indian town, Hoonah.

This is the smallest city hall I ever seen.

 A small cafe with sign boards of different languages.

 This is part of the view of Hoonah.

 After half day wondering around in Hoonah and the port, we left for Ketchikan, our last port of call for our Alaska cruise. This is a rainy town, it rains almost everyday, according to the locals here, is a wet town.

 A view of a part of Kitchikan.

           Back to our cabin saw a monkey hang at the celling , so cute!!  Towel folding animals are very popular in most of the cruises now aday. The house maid will fold an animal a day when make up the cabins.

 A dog with my sunglasses on

 A pair of swan

 During towel folding demonstration, the house maid show us the folding of teddy bear and bull dog.

 and the elephant too.

 A picture of our group at our main dinning table , our last dinner in this cruise.

Turkey breast

 Prawns and fish fingers

 Chocolate moist cake

 As an appreciation to us all the guests in the cruise, the management held a full chocolate buffet supper for our last night in the cruise.

 All the chocolate desserts were so beautifully crafted and arranged, most of all they taste so good and delicious. We really enjoyed the beauty and the taste of all these chocolates...so......marvelous.

We had a very late night sleep because of our  heavy food and moreover it was our last night in the cruise. It was a very enjoyable cruise with good foods, good entertainments, good companies and good and friendly staffs in the cruise.  We reached Vancouver at about 7am the next morning. That's ended our 8 days 7 nights wonderful and memorable Alaska Cruise.  I will continue my blog with the rest of my whole month vacation from Vancouver to New York.