Juneau where we are?

Day 4 – Juneau

The thing is, unless you’re willing to pay the crazy prices to use the ship’s internet & cell service, you leave your phone in airplane mode. That means that it doesn’t get its clock set correctly when we change time zones, which is why I was at the gym at 6 this morning. I ended up hanging out in the crows’ nest doing the Sudoku until it was time for stretch and abs classes. This morning was Angie again, and she really is just going through the motions. It turns out one of the guys in the stretch class is in the cabin next door to ours, and in between classes he muttered “She has all the charisma of a sack of potatoes,” which is true, but her classes are actually pretty good in terms of the stretch/workout you get.

We did breakfast in the Lido because we weren’t up for a long wait, and then we went back to the cabin to prepare for our first shore excursion of the trip – a helicopter ride to the Mendenhall glacier, including 2 hours trekking around on it. We were nervous because last time we tried to take a helicopter to the Mendenhall glacier we got all the way to the part where they take off, and they shut down the helicopter because the weather was too bad. Today’s weather was not looking too good either. So we put on lots of layers (Dave got it right; I had on 2 turtlenecks, a fleece vest, and a fleece sweatshirt, in addition to double long underwear and wool pants on the bottom half – too many clothes!) and headed out to the dock. There were 4 full sized cruise ships in port and more souvenirs than you can possibly imagine, and I know you can imagine a lot.

From the dock we got in the van, which took us to the Juneau international airport and the headquarters of Northwest Trekking. There we got glacier boots (kind of like ski boots), safety harnesses, waterproof jackets and pants and gaiters. Then they gave us several safety lectures and loaded us onto the helicopters. Dave and I got to sit in front, me next to the pilot and him on my other side. It was very good. We put on our headsets and they spun up the rotors, just like last time, but this time we actually took off! I love flying in helicopters, I don’t know why. Small planes make me really nervous, but helicopters don’t bother me at all, even when they bounce around.

We flew around getting some scenic views of the Mendenhall glacier and a few others and the surrounding area, and then we landed. We landed on the Mendenhall glacier! They put crampons on our boots and gave us ice axes and we spend the next 2 hours or so climbing around on the glacier, up and down and through the little streams of water being totally blown away by the blueness and the grandeur and the sheer astonishing reality of walking around on a river of ice.  It was better than we thought it could be, and we thought it could be spectacular. They’d given us bottled water, and at one point they had us open the bottles, dump out the water, and fill it with glacier water. Glacier water is the best water I’ve ever had, even better than Forest Grove water. You might be thinking it was also a nature experience, but there were pretty much helicopters taking off and landing continuously. It’s a big glacier though, so we never actually ran in to any other groups.

All too soon it was time to head back. We got back in the helicopter, which moves like a Segway in the air, flew back to the airport, divested ourselves of all the gear, and took the van back to the ship. It was a very good day. But it wasn’t over yet. Dave walked around the dock taking some photos, and I thought I published some blogs and got ready for boot camp with Steve, which was a very very good workout, especially the part at the end where I just lay on the mat and he stretched everything out for me. Which was good, because I’m not sure I could have stretched it out myself. Dave came and started his workout while we were finishing up, and while he was doing his workout I swam around in the Seaview pool (the aft pool on the Lido deck) in the rain. Since we were still docked it wasn’t as much fun as sloshing in the main pool during moderate seas, but it was still fun.

We got back to the cabin at about the same time and were able to shower in our separate showers. Tonight we had reservations at the Pinnacle, so we got dressed up and hung out with the Neptune-HalCats until they took a break, and then with Matt in the crows’ nest for undocking There were 5 or 6 bald eagles circling the ship while we undocked, which was very cool. Then it was time for dinner at the Pinnacle. We split a ribeye and had a very good time, but we both ate way too much.

After dinner we went back to the piano bar and got seats right at the piano, and had a really fun time singing along and trading wisecracks with Nathan until the show got out and the drunk people showed up.  We’ll hang out there again, but leave earlier next time. Then it was already 11:30 and time for bed. It was a very good day.

Tonight’s towel animal: Peacock