30th Anniversary Cruise

30th Anniversary Cruise

Thirty one years ago I met the love of my life, my soulmate, my best friend, my one and only. A year later during a very trying time in my life, we got married. Now here we are, retired enjoying life and each other and thought it was time to celebrate our thirty years of our lives together. We decided to go on another cruise and explore more of our world together. It was a twelve day cruise and this time we went on Celebrity Cruises. This was the first time we have cruised on a line other than Holland America. It was an older ship, the Constellation and it showed a bit. We hear that it will undergo a total upgrade next year. It was still a very nice ship and we enjoyed it. Now I could write a novella about our trip, but I plan on keeping this post as concise as possible. It will just highlight our stops and adventures. The pictures in our photo album will show the true visual log of the trip and can be viewed here!

THE ADVENTURE LIST

Key West – Our first port of call before leaving the US. We had never been here before and it reminded me of my days in Southern California. There were lots of shops, restaurants, bars, and other cool things to do. We walked the main drag of Duvall Street and had drinks near the water at Sunset Pier! It was good that we had a pleasant first stop to make up for the trip from Washington to Florida. We took a red eye flight that arrived on the same day as the cruise departure. We will NEVER make that mistake again. For the both of us it is almost impossible to sleep on a plane. Luckily, the plane was only half full which is a surprise these days. I wandered off to an empty row and tried to catch a few winks. After rolling around and having my face catch the faint aroma of 10,000 assholes, I eventually gave up. As for Debbie, she got not a wink and was an absolute grump when we deboarded. We had a very long wait in the airport in Tampa which did not help matters. I kept my distance. Needless to say, our first night on the ship was a quiet one.

Cartagena, Columbia – We had two days here and we took full advantage of it. Cartagena is a very busy city with lots of traffic. It seemed very chaotic and very large. We signed up for two separate excursions here. One was a sightseeing/food tasting tour. It was quite fun. We saw many interesting locations and tasted different foods and also some very nice Columbian coffee. One of our stops was at the Palace of the Inquisition. It was interesting and spooky at the same time. Very dark time in human history. Leave it to us to always get into some type of trouble. We were told we had roughly half an hour there so we weren’t in any hurry. We had wandered around the palace(museum now) and were on the second floor and happened to be looking out into the square below and saw our tour group all together and leaving!! Oh shit, we hurried down the stairs and headed for the exit just as the museum people were closing and locking the doors!! What a scary thought to be locked in this house of horrors and also to be left behind in Columbia! There was no way we had been there for half an hour! At any rate, we never seem to learn! Another fascinating location was the Castillo San Felipe de Barajas. We briefly saw it on our first excursion, but on day two we did a bus “hop on, hop off” excursion so we could just do things on our own and we went back. This time we went on it and climbed to the top, took in views of the city, then went into the many tunnels located within. I’m glad we returned to explore. We went around the old walled city and explored as much as we could before we had to return to the ship! It was fun and amazing!

Panama – On to the country of Panama. Debbie was very excited about visiting here. We had an excursion planned to go on a boat into the canal and through the locks, but luck would have it that it was cancelled. Nothing the cruise people could do about it. We saw others booked on it doing nothing but incessant complaining. It was all about weather, fog, and cargo ship scheduling. We did the next best thing by booking at least a tour of the canal, locks, and then Panama City. The canal was impressive but it would have been much more fun had we gotten to go through it. There were no ships traversing while we were there, so it was kind of boring. I was much more impressed with Panama City and had no idea it was so big! The skyline is huge and modern. It was much cleaner than Cartagena and traffic flowed much better. It was very busy for a Sunday that we were there. We walked around and saw squares, churches, places of interest, and shops. It was truly amazing!

Costa Rica – Another new country and adventure! I think we had the most fun so far! First we took a river boat tour on the Tortuguero Canal. Our tour guide was very knowledgeable, funny, and really enjoyed what he did. We went cruising up the canal and saw a variety of wildlife including howler monkeys, sloths, iguanas, caymans, herons, among others. It was a very pretty area and so green, also very hot and humid! We then drove through the countryside and stopped by a small banana plantation and learned a bit of growing, caring, and harvesting bananas and pineapples. Costa Rica is rich in biodiversity and also produces many different fruits, vegetables, and coffee. The country also has a very aggressive green policy in place. They are also extremely environmentally friendly…..mostly….as we soon learned. We finally ended up at the Sloth Sanctuary. I had heard about this place many years from a podcast I used to listen to called The Dawn and Drew Show. They were one of the first podcasters and lived in Costa Rica for awhile. Dawn actually volunteered here and they would talk about it on their podcast. Now, here we are actually visiting the place. Most of the sloths here are rescues. They have either been abandoned by their mothers, lost a limb, or blind. Frequently, sloths will mistake a power line for a branch and grab it. They get electrocuted, and if they are lucky enough to live through it, they usually have to have one or more limbs amputated. Many sloths are showing up blind and there are theories, unproven, that pesticides that are sprayed on banana and pineapple plantations are the cause of it. But the plantations and owners of them are protected by the Costa Rican government, so will not listen to concerns. These poor things will live out their lives at the sanctuary and will be taken very good care of. You can see a video we took of one of them just going about their day by clicking here!

Cozumel, Mexico – Cozumel was our final stop on the cruise. We have been to other parts of Mexico, but this was our first time here. We didn’t really see much, but it seemed way more commercial than what we had seen in all previous stops. We had one destination planned and were very excited about it. We went to the Dolphinaris to play with the dolphins! Debbie was like a little girl she was so excited!! It was an absolute blast. We were fed, had drinks, and then got to play, get kissed, hold fins, and get a belly ride with them. They are so cute and playful and seem to be treated very good. They each have their own personalities and some times get in trouble or act up when they don’t get their way! That ended our ports of call for the cruise and it was very exciting.

Sea Days – I will end the post with just some final thoughts of our voyage. We had numerous sea days where we just had fun on the ship. We hit the gym a few times, had drinks by the pools, enjoyed some of the entertainment, and ate most dinners in our favorite restaurant onboard called Blu! But the best thing to happen on this cruise was meeting an enchanting couple from England, Bob and Jane! We had so much fun with them! Most of the time you’ll meet some very cool people on a cruise and bump into them from time to time. We actually hung out together almost every evening and usually ended up in the Martini Bar. They are so much fun and we are going to try and maintain a friendship with them from now on! As of me writing this, Debbie is off to England with her sisters to visit family. She will be planning on getting together with them for dinner while she is there. hopefully, we will be cruising together again in the future. That’s it for now…. Bon Voyage!

VISIT THE PICTURE ALBUM HERE!

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Our Twenty Fifth Anniversary Cruise 2018

Twenty five years ago I met the love of my life and in March of 1993, we married. It was a tumultuous time due to the death of both of my parents within days of each other and just before the date we had set. Because of this, we scrapped a big wedding and had no honeymoon. Now that we have reached the silver anniversary of our marriage, we decided to go big and do a twelve day cruise on the Adriatic. Once again, we cruised on Holland America and sailed on the Oosterdam, our second time on this ship. Years ago on our first cruise we signed up for a Holland America VISA card and get points on everything we spend. After years of using the card, we had enough that one of us almost cruised for free!!!! That helped the trip budget immensely! As you can probably imagine, both of us were very excited as neither had been to any of these locales we were about to see. Debbie has been to other parts of Europe, but this hoedunk from New Mexico hadn’t.

The trip began with a very early pick up and a flight to Philadelphia with a changeover to Venice. It was a looooooooonnnnnnng flight. Neither of us slept at all. As a matter of fact, the first day we were up almost thirty hours. A transfer from the airport to the ship and we were off. The only sights of Venice were from the ship deck as we past. It looked nice, but that’s all I can say! I snapped pictures that you can peruse in the online album. Our first port of call was Split, Croatia and thus began my witnessing histories way longer than our young country! We had no excursion planned and just walked the city on our own. Had lunch in a cool restaurant with great wine, cheese, prosciutto. Markets and shops were everywhere and there was definitely a good vibe in the city. You could see the influence of many different occupations over the centuries in the architecture. The next stop was also in Croatia at Dubrovnik! What a beautiful city!!!! Took a bus to the south in wine country to a family winery that had been in the same family for generations. They started in a 300-year-old house where the original family had 11 members living in it and was very small bungalow. The wine was fantastic and of course we bought some. They also made grappa which they offered as we arrived. Wow what a kick!!! Then we headed north to a family whom produced some of the best olive oil we had ever tasted. Saw how they did it in old ways with a horse drawn olive crushing wheel and had a great lunch that was almost totally grown from the garden and produced locally. Then we headed to the old town of Dubrovnik within the walls of the original city built in the 12th century and protected from the Phoenicians from the sea and the Ottomans from land. If you are a watcher of the TV show Game of Thrones, which I am not, some of the scenes were filmed in Dubrovnik! What a great start to the trip!

Then it was on to Albania. Our stop was in the port of Saranda. During the travels, we saw many abandoned buildings of former economic endeavors. In the early 90’s, communism left the country and many of these economies left with it. Albania is at the bottom when it comes to economies of Europe. Took a 4×4 excursion (ours was really just an BMW) on a drive through the city and countryside exploring the agricultural and mountains of the country. Our driver Emilio was a nice guy out of work and struggling to survive. We first stopped at Lekursei Castle used for defense in the early stages of the country’s history. It was a cloudy and cool day and hazy which made taking photos hard. We then headed to Blue Eye Spring National Park which held a spring called the blue eye. It was amazingly beautiful to see, a spring coming from within the earth to form a river. The waters in the middle of the blue eye were a dark blue and the surrounding areas were of a turquoise and green shades. The water was as pure as you could find, and you could have drunk right from it. We then headed down the hillside to a place for wine and lunch. This is a newer destination for cruise lines partnering with the country to try to stimulate it’s tourism economy.

Emilio our driver

The adventures are just beginning as we next head to the port of Katakolon, Greece, the gateway to the ancient site of Olympia. We didn’t spend a lot of time here as we immediately headed on our tour to Olympia, but when we returned, we walked about before going back onboard. It was a very nice seaside town that reminded me of my time in SoCal. This was the most fascinating tour so far as we took a tour bus to the ancient site of Olympia where the Olympic Games began. To walk among the ruins of practice fields, temples, bath houses, track and fields that were thousands of years old where athletes of Greece and Sparta trained for the games was awesome. We learned a lot of the history of Greece and the Games and discovered that the flame of the Olympic Games is still lit there before each of the Summer/Winter Games. While the tour was good, we felt hurried and didn’t get to explore much of the site. We were told before going back to the bus that we had 20 or so minutes to ourselves, so Debbie and I walked among some of the back areas we didn’t get to see. We returned to the parking lot well within the time we were supposed to and what did we find…..no bus! We waited around and looked around yet nothing. Luckily we weren’t the only couple in this predicament as another pair were in a tizzy looking for the bus too. Finally a different guide came of her bus and asked us which bus we were looking for and shook her head as we told her. Apparently we didn’t hear from our guide that the bus would be found in a lower parking lot than where we got dropped off…..ooops! we were taken to our bus which was waiting for us and as we boarded there was stink eye galore direct toward us! Then headed to the Mercouri Estate Winery, one of the oldest, five generations so far, in Greece and toured the winery and had a great lunch with their wines, local cheeses, meats, and veggies. After some wine and camaraderie around the picnic table, we were no longer the black sheep of the bus.

Next stop was Chania, Greece – on the Island of Crete. Oh my, this place was beautiful!! We did not have any shore excursions booked for this port of call and just decided to do it on our own. We took a shuttle into town and just walked around Chania by map and explored. It was the most vibrant city we had been to! There were shops, cafes, small hotels, and people everywhere. We absolutely loved it there! We spent all day walking the city exploring. Walked to old waterfront seeing old ancient Venetian and Byzantine buildings and walls, walked through a bustling open farmers market and saw some of the best-looking fruits, vegetables, cheeses, and other items we have ever seen. We also went to the old Municipal Market of Chania. It was an indoor market in the heart of the city and there was everything imaginable for sale there. One shop had liquors and spirits that had “tester bottles” and small cups you could pour samples and taste for yourself. Yipeeeeeee! Sat at an outdoor café for a lunch that was, by our standards, very inexpensive and wonderful. It was a very fun day on our own.

Let’s sample some liquor!

Mykonos and Delos, another great adventure in Greece! Took a long excursion into Mykonos with a small spitfire of a woman who was an excellent tour guide. The first thing you notice when arriving in Mykonos is every building is white. Just like Chania, the streets were very narrow, and buildings were crammed together. It was also clean as a whistle, but very quiet as it was early Sunday morning. We did walk by a church having mass and hearing the chant of the priests and parishioners as we passed by was a bit unnerving as some in the group looked in open windows and doors and snapped photos. To me seemed a bit sacrilegious to be doing that. After we toured the town of Mykonos, we got on a sea bus, a large ferry type boat, and went out to the ancient ruins of Delos. It is supposedly the birthplace of the mythical god Apollo and his twin sister Artemis. It was amazingly huge and at one point almost 30,000 ancient Greeks lived there. As large as the excavated portion of the city was, it still only represented 1/7th of the original city. We were in awe exploring rooms, pillars, theaters, ancient cisterns used for drinking water for the city that were thousands of years old. There were ruins scattered throughout the hillside and we learned this ancient city was once the main shipping port for the area and then it was pillaged twice by ancient invaders. Since the city was always thought by the planners to be a safe location, no defensive fortifications were built. After the second invasion, the governing body in Mykonos decided not to invest further monies into the town and slowly trade diminished and people left the island and the site was soon abandoned and left to ruin as it is now. The island is uninhabited except for a few caretakers and I can imagine it might be a spooky place at night! Off to Malta!

Our next port of call was the island of Malta and it’s capital Valletta! Another gorgeous city full of history and wonderful architecture. We took another tour of the city and the three gates to the city. Nowadays there are actually five! We learned of the history of Malta being under the control of the Order of the Knights of St John and seeing all the cathedrals, hospitals, forts, and palaces there. There is actually a Buckingham Palace in Valletta where Queen Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh lived before her accession to the throne. There are close ties between England and Malta. This was going to be an overnight stay for the ship so we didn’t have to board anytime soon so we explored on our own for the rest of the afternoon walking the whole perimeter of the town! We meandered our way to the The Phoenicia Hotel and had some adult beverages and later had dinner in a restaurant where I ordered…..ummmm…..calamari! It was not like the small rings we are used to here but long tubes and tentacles. I ate it anyway and Debbie was amazed! We finally headed back to the ship exhausted.

Kind of looked like this but bigger tubes!

It was a very short trip to our next stop, the island of Gozo. This was a very short visit. We took a public transit bus to the city of Victoria. Like many other cities in Europe, the streets were narrow, never just straight, and always crowded with traffic. These bus drivers over here are very skilled and patient to be able to navigate all these obstacles and crowds. Being a bus driver myself, I was very impressed. We saw what we could of Victoria, had a coffee and went back to the ship. Can I say something about the coffee here…….strong, very good, and all you need is a little! I will keep the next stop within this same paragraph as they were both quick and kind of a blur and a lot of time was spent in a bus going from point A to B. Point A being the city of Palermo on the island of Sicily. And point B being the resort town of Cefalu. Most of what we saw of Palermo was from the seat of a bus on the way to Cefalu. It was a very busy city, lots of grinding traffic, hustle, construction, and tons of mega apartment complexes.It was a very busy working city it seemed. On the other hand, Cefalu was beautiful and an obvious tourist draw. The tiny streets were filled with shops of all kinds and it had nice beaches at it’s seaside. Once again it seemed our time was limited, one of the disadvantages of some of these organized excursions, but really the only way to get a feel of regions of the world you have never been to. One thing we did decide to do, is find a place to get an authentic panini for me and a slice of pizza for Debbie and we were both in heaven when we did. Once we were back in Palermo we had a bit of time to do a short walk before heading back to the ship. We decided to continue our gastric indulgences on some fine Italian pastries. It was well worth the calories. Then it was on to our final stop before being in Rome for disembarking and heading for home, Napoli. We would soon enjoy our most favorite tour of the cruise!!!!

Yummy!!!!

Two things we learned from our wonderfully crazy last tour guide lady who called herself “Da Mama”, Naples is in Florida and Napoli is in Italy. Also, Rome should be referred to as Roma! In that case I shall refer to our next port of call as Napoli of which we saw very little of. From the ship we just saw the port and then it was on a bus to the ruins of Pompeii! On the way, we could see the base of Mount Vesuvius, but the top half was enshrouded by clouds damn! So the mountain erupted in 79AD and is still an active volcano that could erupt again at anytime, yet there was development everywhere around the base of the mountain, hmmmmm! I was also surprised when we arrived at the entrance to Pompeii at the theme park feel of the area. I suppose because it being one of the most visited site in southern Italy. The ruins of the city were vast at around 170 acres. It was estimated that 20,000 people lived in Pompeii at the time of the eruption and approximately 2000 were killed. We saw only a small part of it, but it was absolutely amazing! You could see the ruts of the chariots that roamed the streets in the stones. We could see the ancient Roman inclination for luxuries for the well to do in their highly sophisticated thermal baths and theaters and lavishly decorated homes. It was a fascinated look at life that existed thousands of years ago and we could have spent hours there but had to move on to the next destination. We headed down the Amalfi Coast of Italy to the town of Sorrento. OMG this place was beautiful! Perched on cliffs high above the Bay of Naples it had stunning views, brightly colored buildings, clean, vibrant, and we loved it! We walked around and had a lunch with everyone in the tour then got on what the call jet boats and went to the Island of Capri! We thought Sorrento was beautiful, but this place was even more stunning! It was an absolute paradise. There is a tram that takes you up top to a chic, gorgeous, town that you can tell was loaded with money and is a famous destination for the rich and famous as we witnessed some of the barbies strutting around. The tiny streets were full of high end shops and restaurants and dotted with fancy hotels. We put this place in or bucket list for a future trip destination if we could possible afford a hotel room. These last two stops turned out to be our favorite places……imagine that. Then it was a long jet boat ride back to the terminal and after saying good bye to “Da Momma” and an end to a ten hour day, we boarded the ship and it was on to Roma to end our journey!

Nothing was seen of Roma except the landscape from the cruise terminal to the airport. The airport itself was a miserable cluster fuck of humanity and we were lucky we had hours before our flight left to clear all the security and passport checkpoints. Our first flight took us to London for a quick change and then home to our boy Cordell who we missed so much! A few final thoughts before I close this novella, things were not that expensive over there, lots of Europeans still smoke, litter is a problem in many parts of the places we visited, and most people we met wherever do not like Trump! And that, my friends concludes this installment of life here at the estate, until next time!

Photo Album Link

Voyage Log

Caribbean Cruise 2013

Nieuw Amsterdam

Once again we sailed the high seas and again it was on Holland America. This is our third cruise on this line and have never had a bad experience (I assume you have seen the news). We had a great occasion also as it was our twenty year anniversary!!!! What a better way to spend it than on a glorious ocean liner with a beautiful wife!!

We started by taking a red-eye flight to Ft Lauderdale, my first time to Florida! The problem with that was our arrival was very early in the morning and we couldn’t board the ship until early afternoon. We killed time by hanging out in a Starbucks and walking around a shopping center that most stores hadn’t even opened yet……booooring! When we finally were in the boarding area, we had a big surprise for some friends of ours. Cordell had to stay back in Snoqualmie. He gets to go over and stay with Jenny, our pet sitter! When she picked him up, she was on her way to take care of our friends Rich and Gloria Monsoor that live up here on the Ridge. We talked about where we were going and she said it sounded very familiar. She checked their itinerary, and we were on the same cruise! What is weird about this is, it is the SECOND time it has happened! They were on our last two-week cruise to Alaska! When we found them in the boarding area, they were floored! Now we had cruise buddies!

It was a wonderful cruise and the weather was warm and the seas usually calm. We made stops at Grand Turks where we did a Segway tour and some awesome snorkeling. The overall impression we had there wasn’t that good. People seemed lazy and there was litter and trash everywhere. Seen it, don’t need to go back. Then we hit San Juan, Puerto Rico! What a vibrant place and pretty clean. We hit the Bacardi Distillery and went to the old fort of El Morro and walked through the old tunnels and took great pictures and a video of the surrounding area! Next we stopped in St Maarten on the Dutch side of Philipsburg. It was pretty hot and muggy there but we absolutely loved the place. It was so cool and the people were happy and content. The place was spotless. We walked about the shops and along the boardwalk. We stopped at the Blue Bitch Bar for some refreshingly cold beers and something to eat! Across the Bay we saw some condos that we may be able to stay in via our timeshare so we may be back to the beautiful place! Our last stop was at Half Moon Cay which is a very beautiful island, but owned by the cruise lines and just a place for the passengers to drop some more money! It was fun anyway and they provided a good BBQ! Then it was back to Florida boo hoo! Since we had almost a full day to kill since we were taking a late flight back to Seattle, we decided to do one more excursion. This one was to the Everglades for an airboat ride and a visit to the wild animal center there! It also included a transfer to the airport so that worked out great! We only saw one alligator on the boat ride. The Everglades are very dry and this upsets them and they move to other areas with deeper waters. The animal center was very cool. Debbie held a baby alligator and even touched the tail end of a huge boa which is a feat in itself since she is terrified of snakes. Finally we got on the plane for an uneventful trip home. It was a great time! Check out the pictures here! Can’t wait to see what happens during the next twenty years!

Our Second Alaskan Cruise

Back we went to Alaska for yet another cruise. This time it was a two-week cruise on the MS Amsterdam. Back in 2007, we had gone on a one week cruise at about the same time of year on a larger ship, the MS Oosterdam. The Amsterdam is very similar just smaller, and very nice. It was a fantastic time and in all of my working career, I have never taken two weeks off at the same time! Of course, I didn’t want to go back to work obviously. Being gone so long, we did have concerns for our babies, Cordell and Patience and just what to do with them for so long. Finally one of our good neighbors came to the rescue and offered to take care of them while we were gone. They could stay in their own home and feel comfortable and she would come over and take care of their needs. Things seem to work out great, although we think it may have stressed Cordell out a bit. We are back now and he is a happy boy. Patience just took it in stride and probably demanded and received plenty of love from our neighbor. Speaking of neighbors, when we had booked our cruise way back earlier in the year, I blogged about it briefly. It turned out that some Packer friends of ours who happen to live up here on the Ridge were going on the same cruise! It was fun to have people we knew already on the ship! We actually shared transportation to and from the ship in Seattle. Another unexpected thing on the cruise was the weather! For the most part, we had sunny skies, mild temperatures, and only light breezes. The captain and crew said it was the best weather on a voyage that they had all season. We really lucked out. We hit quite a few ports of call and some we’d seen before and since I don’t want to bore you with too many details, I make s synopsis of the whole thing.

Our first stop was Ketchikan after sailing the Inside Passage. We had been to Ketchikan before, but hadn’t taken any shore excursions here. This time we did and boy was it a blast! We took the Mountaintop Float Plane Tour and Crab Feast. We were bussed up to an old cannery where we had an all you could indulge crab feast. Man was it good. Then we took a float plane off the waters of George Inlet Fjord and flew over the inland mountains and peaks just east of the town. We saw mountain goats, beautiful untouched lakes, and gorgeous waterfalls. We then flew over town and over our ship and landed back in town! Then we watched The Great Alaskan Lumberjack Show where we saw some of the world’s best lumberjacks go head to head in more than a dozen live exciting events such as chopping, sawing, relay races, axe throwing, log rolling and a 50-foot speed climb. It was fun and we got a lot of good pictures.

Next stop was Sitka. Sitka is a very beautiful town. It was here, in 1867 that the US bought Alaska Territories from Russia for $7,200,000 in gold! Here we took a boat ride to Kruzof Island and rode 4×4 ATV’s on old logging roads across the island to the North Beach. It was a  guided tour and they fed us well and saw many wonderful sights! back in town we had to find the local watering hole and we did, a place called Ernie’s Old Time Saloon. It was definitely a local hang out and there were some very unique characters in there.

The next day found us in Skagway. Skagway, for an old mining town, was very touristy if you ask me. The whole town was a jumble of trinket and jewelry shops. There was still some old character left to the town, but the big money maker now was cruise passengers. We didn’t hang around town for long as we headed out on a Yukon Jeep Tour. This was a fun tour as a bunch of us in well maintained Jeeps drove up the old gold rush trails of 1898 over White Pass into Canada’s Yukon Territory! We stopped at an old crossroads town called Carcross, originally called Caribou Crossing. Then we headed into the hills and up Montana Mountain where we saw a  panorama included a view of the Carcross Desert, the smallest desert in the world. It was a bumpy road and a little hairy at times but was a great trip!

We also made a stop in Anchorage, Alaska’s largest city and I was surprised at how big it actually was! Again, we didn’t see much of the city as we took an all day excursion on the Alaksa Railroad Granview Tour. We traveled down the Grandview Valley and it is one of the most scenic areas of the entire railbelt and is only accessible by train. We saw two beautiful glaciers, the Spencer and Bartlett. We also saw a mommy bear and her cub off in the meadow. We looked for moose, but didn’t see any! It was some of the most beautiful scenery we have ever partaken.

Another stop was Homer which is very beautiful they say, but the fog had us socked in all day long and visibility was down to just block ahead of you. We did walk around town and down the Homer Spit where we stumbled into another famed watering hole, the Salty Dawg Saloon. Hmmmm, we seem to find pubs and taverns everywhere we go!

Kodiak was on the agenda and boy was that a beautiful place. We had no excursions planned, but did walk the town and visited the Baranov Museum, which is housed in one of the oldest buildings in Alaska.

One of my favorite places in Alaska is Juneau! I love this town despite all the rain it supposedly receives. We did one our most fun excursions there. We boarded a helicopter, neither of us had ever been in one, and flew out of town, over the mountains. We flew over the Juneau Ice Fields and then landed on the Mendenhall Glacier. Wow is all I could say at the time! We spent some time walking on the glacier and looking at all the tints of blues and crystal you see. There were rivers of ice melt flowing on, through and under the glacier. It was fantastic. I would love to live here….I am always saying that!

Those were our ports of call. We also cruised Glacier Bay and saw the wonders and awe of the Johns Hopkins, Margerie, Grand Pacific, Lamplugh, and Reid glaciers. I also caught a fantastic shot of a calving of the Margerie. We also cruised into the Bay of Disenchantment and marveled at the Hubbard Glacier which is huge! Debbie shot a photo series of a very large calving off the glacier,  just awesome!

Well getting to the end of this extravaganza, as you know there is plenty of eating and drinking on these cruises and we did plenty of both (probably I more than Debbie). There were days spent at sea and voyages between ports that we occupied ourselves on board and there was plenty to do. There was a gym, pools, jacuzzi, a casino which we spent allot of time in and lost most of the time. We learned to play Caribbean Stud and three card poker and had fun at it even though the house took our money. The ship had many lounges and bars aboard and one of our favorites was the Crow’s Nest. It was at the top of the ship and had great views and I even did karaoke there, my first time! You had to be there. I cannot forget all the great entertainment and entertainers we watched. Some of them included Pianist Diane Fast, Comedian and Magician Jonathan Neal, Lorna Luft, Paul Pappas who was phenomenal, Dave Levesque, and the amazing ventriloquist Brad Cummings. Now Brad and I have a special bond…..I sat on his knee! During his show, we just happened to be sitting in the front row and he singled me out to pick on. Later he invited me on stage to be his “dummy”! If you saw my video in the previous post, you’ll know the rest is history. I had the whole ship rolling with laughter and was a celebrity for a few days. People kept running into me saying what a hilarity it was and the best thing they had seen! Ahh my fleeting touch with fame….sigh! It was a fantastic vacation, cruise, get away, you name it and was all made better by having friends aboard we could share it with! Can’t wait until the next one. Cruising is the only way to vacation!!!!

SOME CRUISE FACTOIDS

Total miles: 3964
Avg Speed: 17.4 knots
Fuel Consumption: approx 39,000 gal/day
Potable Water Production: 370,000 gal/day
Potable Water Consumption: 160,000 gal/day
Number of guests: 1442
Number of Crew: 597
Ship Length: 781 feet
Ship Width: 106 feet
Gross Tonnage: 62,735 tons
Total Power: 41,500 HP
Max Speed: 24.5 knots

From Our Website

This a typical post from our web site and is the latest. I decided to make it a blog post and our web site will slowly revert to this blog. Enjoy! I left the above picture up from the last update because our little guy Simon is still having thyroid problems. He had to have a first surgery to have his thyroid removed, but in some cases of thyroid disease in cats, some tissue remained and came back. We had to take him in for yet another surgery. He didn’t bounce back this time like he did from the first one, but he is still hanging in there the best he can. We have realized that he is way more resilient than we ever knew. We just hope he can recover fully and have a few more good years, but when his time comes, that’s it for pets for awhile. Now, for what has been going on at the Estate!

We have really been enjoying our boat this summer. Back in June we took or longest trip yet up to Roche Harbor in the San Juan Islands for a big boat gathering of Bayliner boat owners. There were over 200 boats there and Larry and Lynette also joined us. We had a great time, but the weather didn’t cooperate like we wanted and we got rained on. On the way, our friends Tori and Kevin just happened to be on San Juan Island where they have a vacation home. We let them know when we were cruising by and they snapped some pretty cool photos of us out in the sound. We had come across a very large pod of orca whales and they were cruising along side us. I have uploaded them, so check them out by clicking here. Now for the bad news, we had our fist boating accident ALREADY!!! It happened on the 4th of July. We had guests aboard which included Carl, one of our dock buddies, and Debbie’s sister Dani and her husband Terry and son Truxton. We had just been out on the water for less than half an hour and had navigated into the log boom by the Tacoma waterfront. We were cruising at idle speed amidst hundreds of other boats and was looking for a place to tie up and begin enjoying the festivities. Out of the blue, a 41 foot 18 ton sailboat under power came right at us. All I had time to do is hit the horn and tried to maneuver somewhat to an angle at him and got slammed. His bow pulpit with anchor plowed through our port side window, into our salon, ripped out the wood support beam and through the aft window. Then his bow hit the side of our fiberglass area above the hull. It was disastrous and did massive damage to our boat. Nobody was injured thankfully, but Debbie was really bummed that her baby was now wrecked. Then the asshole took off without even a word of concern. Debbie got on the radio and called the Coast Guard. They and the Tacoma Police showed up and apprehended the guy and we learned he was drunk out of his mind. He was hauled off to jail. Since the accident, we have been in contact with the actually owner of the sailboat who was his sister-in-law. She is fully covered with insurance and said the guy is a real loser and wasn’t even supposed to be on the boat. Her insurance company is covering all the repairs to our boat. We had a boat surveyor do a damage survey and the result was very extensive. We will be coming out of this with new windows, wood, carpet, upholstery, repairs to our flybridge and radar arch, new gelcoat and complete waxing of the fiberglass, and more. It is estimated that the damage assessment will be close to $50K and will be out of the water at least a month and probably more. I have damage pictures posted here, and when we get her back and all fixed, we’ll take some more pictures and post the results of the repair work.

But we have done some boating on a somewhat larger vessel just recently. At the end of September we went on a cruise to Alaska on the ms Oosterdam! Neither one of us had ever been on a cruise before and it was so much fun!!! We had a seven night cruise and made stops in Juneau, Hoonah, and Ketchikan. We love Alaska and I could live up there. Not too sure about Debbie though. You think it rains here, well it rains three times as much up in the Alaskan panhandle. But the scenery and beauty of the area is worth the liquid sunshine. We saw bears, whales, dolphins, eagles, and seals. I set up a picture album you can see by clicking this link. We also took a couple of short videos with Debbie’s camera. The first one is of Mendenhall Glacier which is just north of Juneau. The second one is Debbie dancing a Tlingit tribal dance while we were in Honnah. She is very cute.  Anyway we are back to reality and now will try to work off all the indulgence experienced while afloat!!!

Well, guess Debbie has been doing lately? Some of you may know this, but Debbie is Welsh by birth and since she arrived in the great US of A around 44 years ago, she has remained a resident alien. That designation has just changed as Debbie has now become a US citizen!!! She is very happy and proud and this has been a long time coming. She passed every question on her citizenship test. Now she can do what she has wanted to for years and that is VOTE!! I guess now, we will have to keep our own voting preferences to ourselves. We are all very proud of our new US citizen and a very cute one at that. Check out some pictures of her getting sworn in.

And now for some more exciting news, the day I have waited for for almost 15 years has come……….Alex has moved out of the house!!!!!!! He landed a great job in marketing with Milgard Windows down in Fife, which is near Tacoma. His new place is also in Fife which means his commute is only about five minutes. He found a very nice one bedroom apartment in a newer complex with all kinds of amenities. He is close to where Debbie works, so they can hook up for lunches and dinners from time to time and he is also closer to his gal Mo. it has been a win-win for everyone and now we finally are empty nesters….yaaaaaahoooooooooo!!!!!!! Now my first project coming in the future will be to completely rearrange and organize the garage now that all of his stuff is outta there. Let’s see how long it takes me to get around to doing it!!!

I should also give you a Ryan update before I close this latest chapter. He is doing great and working very hard. He had a job offer from a competing company that really wanted him. Instead of just bailing on his current company, he went in and had a face to face with the owner about the offer, the problems he saw, suggestions on making things better for him and all the other employees, and other gripes. Not only did the owner listen to him, but he got a huge pay raise in addition to making many changes that Ryan suggested. Now the company is making money hand over fist and everyone is happier and working much harder. He will be doing big things in the future. His boss took him and some of their important clients on a fishing trip to Alaska recently. Ryan had a great time and brought home a ton of fish and it was totally paid for and he didn’t even have to use his own vacation time. Just goes to show you how much Ryan has progressed in his career. He has his own place with his cats and dog and is enjoying the single life when he can.

I’ll finish up with my last bit sad news and let you go. On the morning of September 23rd we lost our very good friend Mike Campbell. Mike was my first friend made when I moved up to Seattle back in 1990. He was a very good guy, very generous with himself with others too. We had a great time with him and his wife Jane, getting together over beers and solving the world’s problems. He will be missed very much. Good bye Mikey, we will miss you very much! Until next time, thanks for visiting!!!! See ya on the web!!!! Ahoy!!!!!