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Meandering through maples

August - September 2018
A 30-day adventure by Helen Read more
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  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    Day 12

    Rocking the Rockies

    September 3, 2018 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 19 °C

    I was beginning to wonder whether we were going to meet our quota of wildlife today.   It was nearly six o'clock before we finally met the quota, but what a prize.  But we come to the end of the day too soon. We will go back to the beginning of the day.

    I woke before the alarm, which isn't a surprise. I took a quick glance at my phone and saw both the local and the Melbourne time  and realised that if I got up then and there I could have myself dressed, and packed before the alarm and that would give Ross time for a shower. He had said that, because of the early start, he would forego his morning shower, but I knew that would make him unhappy, so I was pleased things had gone so well with my early waking. I would be able to leave the bathroom free for Ross' shower and all would be well for the day.

    I was even more pleased with myself when, fifteen minutes later I was fully refreshed, dressed and almost finished packing my bag.   I turned to Ross and said " Time to wake up. Ross.  Ross. Come on, time to wake up".  He looked and sounded a bit grumpy at being woken, but this is normal so I kept going.  He argued with me that it was too early.  I told him I had finished with the bathroom and he could have a shower if he wanted to.  That was when he checked his watch and informed me that it was only 1.30 am.  I had read the Melbourne time and not the Banff time and I wasn't supposed to get up for another four hours. Ross turned over and went straight back to sleep.  I sat for a minute contemplating my choices then lay down and had another sleep until 5.30.   We then completed the plan as I had foreseen, Ross had his shower and we were ready to leave our room by six am.

    We had both decided that two breakfasts was at least one too many so just waited in the lobby until we were called to get on the bus. This wasn't long and we were taken to the station to await the arrival of the Rocky Mountaineer. Clearly this was not like jumping on a regular train. Much fanfare, special stepladders and rolled out red carpet for we who were travelling Gold Leaf.  Nothing more than we deserve of  course!   Up the stairs to the top floor where the poshest, roomiest, leather seats awaited, with one set of buttons that raised a foot rest and tilted the chair into a gentle recline and another set of buttons that adjusted the lumbar support of the chair and personalised the temperature controls. These were nestled under vast windows that gave us panoramic views all the way around and at an elevated height that had us all looking down on the rest of the world.

    We were introduced to our staff for the trip and just before they began the safety routine, we were asked to look out the window to our left. There, in full Rocky Mountaineer uniform, was the entire staff of the Banff station standing in a row, as a guard of honour, holding a Canadian flag aloft and waving us goodbye.  I just can't see the staff of Belgrave Station doing that as people head off to the  city.

    The train offered full sit down breakfast a la carte. Ross went for the Eggs Benedict and I had the blueberry pancake.  We began with a complementary berry smoothie and followed it up with our choice of beverage. On top of my pancake was an unusual fruit. I assumed it was edible and did so. It was yellow and sweet with tiny hard little seeds inside. Surrounding the fruit was a papery pod that seemed a strange thing indeed. I ask Amelia, our Derby born waitress, what this thing was. She replied that is was a gooseberry. It was quite unlike the Chinese gooseberries we get. It was yummy.

    Within minutes of returning to our seats on the top floor, (meals are served in the dining car on the first floor) we were offered snacks and more drinks.  This became the pattern of the day. Three course meals, then snacks and drinks almost incessantly throughout the day. 

    It is extraordinarily comfortable in Gold Leaf, (Ross keeps saying "Luxury" in an English north country accent) and the staff are always checking in to ensure we are ok and not starving. As if!! The staff also provide information, stories, entertainment, games and competitions during the day. Nothing too complex and usually associated with information about where we were.  We were given a pop quiz at the end of the day. Could we name the seven rivers we had followed in our journey today? They were the Bow, Kicking Horse,  Columbia, Beaver, Illecilliwaet, Eagle and SouthThompson. See I was paying attention.

    We moved steadily down from 1500 feet above sea level to 1200 feet. It was sometimes interesting to see how they got that done. The maximum gradient  early trains  could manage was 2.2 and in one part, the natural gradient was over four. Eventually the enginers developed special constructions called spiral tunnels. They built two of these tunnels. The first turns left inside the mountain at 226 degrees to brings the train out 50 ft lower.   Then later, the train enters a second tunnel, travelling right by 226 degree to come out a further 56 feet lower. This lowered the track by 106 feet and kept within the 2.2 gradient They are all very proud of this feat of engineering.

    We were still in the high peaks seeing snowfields and waterfalls. A fellow traveller sitting behind me remarked that she kept saying "Wow" in disbelief and awe at what she was seeing. Her friend said that she kept pinching the first woman to see if this was really happening. I suggested that this was not the normal way of doing things, but that one usually pinched oneself. She informed that this made no sense. "Why hurt yourself? "and when her friend yelped, she knew it was all real.

    For the second time we heard the explanation of the naming of Kicking Horse river which we followed for some of the day. Dr James Hector was both an explorer and doctor. While crossing a difficult river and leading his horse across it, the horse became distressed and broke free. Hector went after it but the frightened horse kicked him and he fell. When his team gathered around him they declared him dead and began to dig him a grave. They placed his body in the grave in all solemnity, but almost immediately he came to and sat up, scaring the geewillikers out of everyone. Many years later he was invited to come back to a newly established wilderness hotel for the adventurous wealthy, as a raconteur in residence. He brought his son, a recent uni graduate with him, to show him where his unused gravesite was still very obvious. However, before they began their excursion, his son had a ruptured appendix and died. Talk about irony! Hector couldn' t bear to remain so he left without finding his old gravesite. Sad story in the end.

    I was becoming concerned about our lack of wildlife sightings today. I had managed to get shots of the swamplands created by beaver and perhaps also, an old and discarded beaver lodge, but no beaver. I thought that maybe I should bring this failure to the attention of our guide who had assured us we would see lots of wildlife,(just to tease him of course).

    Twice we were told to look out certain windows to see bears but they had scarpered before we got there. I was beginning to feel disappointed, not with the trip or the train, just the no sightings. That was when I looked out my window and looked down into the river below (the Eagle River). I realised that we were watching the first of the salmon spawning and dying in the waters. Already dead fish were lying by the side of the river while more and more fish made their way to the spawning grounds. Crows were eating the dead fish. As I watched, I saw a female offer up her 4000 eggs to a male who spread his milt over them, fertilizing them. There was a little flurry in the water and the deed was done. Now they only had to wait to die. Sad. We learned that out of the 4000 eggs laid, only two salmon make it back safely after a few years. That is a huge attrition rate.

    After I had snapped a few images of the red chinook salmon I began looking for the beast that loves to eat fish. Strong adult male bears will catch the best, healthiest and strongest fish earlier on. The family groups with children will take the weakened fish. I was sure, if I watched the banks, I would see a bear. Constant surveillance out the window was exhausting and I had just about decided that this was not going to happen. I made a mental note to speak to our tour guide to complain of the paucity of wildlife, when the cry "Bear" came up. Off to our left, on a cleared patch of ground, sat a black bear sitting on his bottom watching the world go by. Sighted, but not photographed, we had added a bear and salmon to our list. Fantastic. Everyone was delighted.

    When our guide came by, I jokingly told him that he had had a lucky escape. Then he showed me what he had come across the day before while going on a short hike in the forest. He showed me a mother black bear, cinnamon in colour, and her three cubs, two black and one cinnamon coloured. The mother had been collared and was not overly frightened of humans, but she was not keen to be out in public with her cubs so she took them back into the forest. Our guide called the sighting in and Park Rangers were able to say she was a local and known to them.

    On the subject of bears, there are some places in Canada where it is illegal to own a rubbish bin. All rubbish must be taken to a bearproof central bin in each neighbourhood to prevent bears moving in to housing areas. The bins are for household waste, recyclables and compost, all of which are attractive to bears. I just know I would not volunteer to drop the rubbish in the bin late at night! And it just adds another quirky but admirable thing about Canadians that appeals to me.

    We discussed today that there must be some piece of legislation that required all Canadians to wave at trains and buses. Failure to do so must mean deportation to the grumpy south (the USA). Everywhere we went, people waved at us. They waved from footpaths, cars, boats and front porches. They waved from canoes and paddle boats on the river, from inside cars, from hilltops and ravines. Waving must be a course at Primary School because people of all ages wave cheerily accompanying the wave with a big smile.

    There is one woman, called Doris, whose dog alerts her to the imminent arrival of the Rocky Mountaineer and she goes out the front to wave at every train. She became so well known by all crews that everyone on board was asked to wave at her and they did. So did we! She waved back madly and blew kisses. Some time ago, the company learned of this and gave her a free ticket on the train. When the train went by her house, the whole station staff of nearby Kamloops station had driven out there to stand on her porch and wave at her. Really sweet! We were delighted to see her and to continue the happy story.

    The longer I stay in Canada, the nicer is my feeling of being here. People couldn't be nicer! All my jadedness is wafting away!    Read more

  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    Day 13

    Pride and Prejudice in Vancouver

    September 4, 2018 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 20 °C

    Today was our second and final day on the Rocky Mountaineer. The service did not diminish and the extraordinary efforts by the staff to meet our every need and preempt it was maintained. Again, the staff at Kamloops, was standing in line to farewell us with the usual big smile and wave. The guest is clearly the most important element of their work and we are absolutely pampered. At times, such efforts to promote my comfort and happiness, felt awkward. We are so familiar with taking care of ourselves that when someone else rushes to do it for us and is so considerate of us, it can be both uncomfortable and delightful. I was offered an arm to get down from difficult steps, to take my bag, to put santising lotion on my hands and provide food service in both an efficient, thoughtful and cheerful way for the whole time. They were not standoffish, but friendly and prepared to have a joke. They treated us better than family, even to the point of remembering something about each of us and shaking our hands in a farewell . When we arrived in Vancouver, the Vancouver staff were waiting in a line, waving and smiling and holding flags to welcome us in the same way we had been sent off at Banff and Kamloops. Clearly they have studied their processes and elevated the role of service to something far beyond that we are used to. Congratulations to Rocky Mountaineer! They are rightly proud of their service.

    But what did we see and do today? And did we make our quota of wildlife?

    Our first surprise was as we travelled out of Kamloops. We slowed down as we passed a small graveyard. It was clearly quite old and not at all posh. Our guide on the train told us that this was the last resting place of the Kamloops Eight . It seems that, as part of their initiation into adulthood of the local first nations people, the Secwepemc (pronounced Shwapem) peoples, young men were painted symbolically then sent out to kill a deer using stealth. They had to be extremely quiet. When they were successful they returned to the village and were admitted into adulthood. When it came to the First World War, some of the Secwepmec men joined up and went to the front with the Canadian forces. While there, they were sent out to reconnoitre and identify the numbers and disposition of the enemy and come back with this critical information. As a result, or so it is claimed, the Canadian forces had lower casualties than any of the other national forces involved. This also has a proud place in the consciousness of Canadians.

    Then along came the Second World War. This time it was all about secret communications. We had Enigma and Bletchley Park focusing on writing and deciphering codes. But there was one Canadian code that could not be broken. The young men of the Secwepemc peoples were able to communicate all sorts of important information to each other in their traditional tongue and pass on secrets to their commanders. It had never been written down and only these young men knew it. This was a code that no-one could break. Again, it is asserted that this code enabled the Canadians to suffer some of the fewest casualties of the war. True or not, it is something worthy of consideration. Clearly these people hold a strong place in the hearts of their local and the wider Canadian peoples. More pride.

    As we gathered steam and passed more and more long goods trains (we were told that some could be as long as 4 km!) we followed initially the South Thompson River, and then the Thompson River itself, after passing the point of confluence of the South with the North Thompson. David Thompson is another hero to the Canadians. He traipsed all over British Columbia, Alberta and much of Western Canada, mapping it out, documenting the rivers, meeting bands of first nations peoples and setting up trade routes. He is compared to Lewis and Clark, two famous American explorers, who sound like two jolly gentlemen on a jaunt across America, by contrast. Well, we know that Lewis and Clarke did an amazing job, but it seems that Thompson, without the fanfare, did better. He just loved the work and wouldn't leave it alone. He is credited as being one of the most important explorers EVER! Canadian pride is not to be challenged.

    What I find extraordinary is that his wife, a first nations woman, went with him often and between them they had thirteen children. I can only hope that some of the story got left out because travelling with up to thirteen children and more often than not, pregnant or feeding a child, would be hard enough for someone with a big car, a caravan, several tents, made roads and extensive road maps, but it seems she did it with fur pelts for shoes and clothes, while hunting for food, living under the stars or in makeshift tents, in what was extremely dangerous terrain, hungry wild animals all around them and in all seasons, often in very deep snow. This woman needs greater recognition than her husband, if the story is complete. I hope that she occasionally got to stay home while he went off but no-one has mentioned it so far! Amazing!

    As for our wildlife quota, I have to admit some disappointment. I so wanted to get a decent picture of a bear, an elk, a deer or any of the other creatures on our list. Again my hopes were thwarted. By the time anyone spotted an animal, we had little time to point and click. Then, more often than not, one of the several billion trees in this country would just pop up and obscure the creature in the shot. If there were no trees, the photo was still distorted because of the window glare or speed or distance which made the image fuzzy. All I can say, as I have said before, a definite sighting but no photo. Sigh!

    Today there was a bear, but I missed him completely. Then there were horned sheep, all brown against a brown slope and a blur; a beautiful deer, visible for a nanosecond between tree clumps; but marginally more successful were the eagles. We saw quite a few bald eagles around the edge of a huge lake. They had white heads (not bald at all), big talons and were generally sitting still on branches of dead trees watching for prey in the water. I saw one flying low across the surface of the water too but he was just scoping the area, not catching anything.

    We also saw the nests of osprey, another apex predator, particularly with fish. These birds are large and nest on tops of tall trees and telephone and power poles. This is not healthy for the birds, nor jolly news for the power company, so when seeing the intentions of the osprey to set up house in a region, the locals mount a large pole near the modern infrastructure so the bird can nest and remain safe. I saw something similar in Switzerland with the stork. It was nice to see the effort being made. We didn't see the bird!

    Within the same region we were told to look out towards a hillside and see the work of the graduating classes of the secondary school students. It was very amusing. There, on the hillsides, were declarations about each graduating class. I could see examples going back over thirty years. How lovely of the town to allow them to do this and to maintain the tradition of putting up huge letters saying "Graduating Class" and the year, on the road out of town. It certainly beats making students feel unwelcome when they want to leave their mark. I suspect several generations of townsfolk have been responsible, so I doubt if they could criticise the students. The owner of the land must also be a generous soul.

    There were several geographical features worthy of comment from today and they aren't about heights, distances, or nomenclature. One is the explanation of the types of rivers we have been following. High in the mountains, where rivers are fed by glaciers, we have braided rivers. (They can occur anywhere if conditions are right.) This means that the river breaks up, comes back together again, shifts direction and then finds itself again after passing an island or some other divergent source. If you imagine braiding hair and excluding then including bands of hair but ultimately holding itself together, then that is how these rivers work. Lower down and with bigger rivers and more force in the water, the river tends to run as one. We have seen both now. When we finally left the Thompson River it met and joined the Fraser River, named after Thompson's admired competitor. This massive river force is also the source of the major salmon run in this part of the world. Much wealth for Western Canada and its natural health stems from this river. It is also how they transport many logs from the logging coops on the mountains.

    The other feature was one that had me a little concerned. We hugged the edges of steep mountain ranges for hundreds of miles. Many of the mountain faces were very steep and, to my eye, decidedly unsafe. We saw the avalanche shelters earlier in our trip and these shelters are absolutely necessary when snow comes down so heavily. But here we were at the end of summer and in these lower reaches we could not see any snow but there was frequent evidence of major mudslides, rockslides and signs of powerful erosion of sandy cliffs left by earlier geological forces. Our guide pointed out that in some of the more extreme and predictable cases, special fences carrying electrical signals catch the first wave of falling debris and send a message to say that the railroad must close until inspected and cleared. Well I saw over a hundred kilometres of seriously unstable surfaces, by my standards (I am not brave when faced with the possibility of being engulfed by several tonnes of rocks). I would have called it all, Avalanche Valley. I seemed to be the only one concerned, so maybe I was over reacting, but I don't think so. Maybe this is my prejudice, but I wonder how long it will be before we hear of the collapse of part of these canyons.

    Today's blog seems to have become very serious. Here is something delightful to finish. The Canadians have another word new to me. It is called a Parkade. It took me a time to work it out but it is a parking lot, presumably a little more sophisticated than a slab of tarmac, but not much more. It might be enclosed such as under buildings or, as I saw when arriving at our hotel, built just for bicycles. I shall watch its usage and try to refine its meaning. A job for tomorrow perhaps.    Read more

  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    Day 14

    Venturing around Vancouver

    September 5, 2018 in Canada ⋅ ☀️ 18 °C

    Although we still had to be up early to get to our first point of call today, it was still a day with some free time to catch breath, eat less and even put feet up for a short while. That should not be read as a lazy day. It was rather a rich day of taking our time.

    Breakfast was on the top of Grouse Mountain, looking out over Vancouver. It was the usual sumptuous feast and I finished off my sampling of the fare with a gingerbread biscuit in the shape of a bear with chocolate dots for his facial features. We had arrived, after a short bus trip from our hotel, at a gondola, which they call a tram, and this took us to the top of the mountain. Our Australian guide met us and took us to our breakfast. Yet again we found the Aussie accent strongly represented in Canadian tourism.

    If it seems that travelling to the top of a mountain by bus and gondola, to be met by a guide, for breakfast, seems a little overkill (after all, how much assistance do we need to find meals?), well that is not all we set out to achieve.

    Yes, our quota was well and truly met today. We saw, not one, but two grizzly bears this morning, one coastal bear and one inland variety. They were wild bears and would be able to decapitate an adult human with one swing of their enormous paws, with claws as long as ten centimetres. According to our information, a bear like this can run 64 kilometres an hour for a sustained period of time if needed and desired. Usain Bolt, the fastest man on earth today, can manage only 43 kilometres an hour and can't sustain it as long as the bear. Fortunately these bears, while certainly active, were not inclined to want to run. They are coming towards the end of their summer, are filling up quickly and will be heading for hibernation soon, so were more interested in not over-exerting themselves but ate grass and roots to fill their bellies. Another thing that stood in our favour was that both bears were males and there was no female about. We have learned of the blinding power of testosterone on rational thinking and so without females getting involved in the mix, we found this did not cause an issue for us. Equally, had one of the bears been female with a cub, then our lives could have been in danger, because NOTHING gets between a mother bear and her cub.

    The one other thing that kept us safe in this outdoor wilderness space was that the bears were behind a fence, well fed and familiar with humans. Both bears (Grinder and Coola) were found starving as tiny cubs, one so small he had to be fed intravenously until stable. Neither had grown up with a family to teach them the ways of the wild. In one case, the vet who found one of them by the side of the road and who waited and waited for the mother to return, rescued and restored the tiny cub and is still acting as his vet to this day.

    The bears are fed a good diet for bears but not so regularly or habitually as to form a pavlovian psychological dependency. They are not fed live food, but our guide said she certainly could not guarantee the safety of any squirrel that entered the bears 5 acre enclosure.

    The bears had to be taught how to hibernate, which seems a tricky thing to do, but they now have it worked out. They hibernate for about five months. This should not be understood to be sleeping though. They wake most days, stretch their limbs to avoid atrophy, eat a little something, then go back to sleep. Ross felt this sounded exactly like the perfect life and not dissimilar to his own.

    The bears can never be released or they would most certainly die. They will never be brought a mate because the presence of a female would cause them to fight and potentially kill each other. At the moment they are good friends and play with each other as cubs might. No captive bred female would be able to manage two males and it would be cruel to bring in a wildborn female and enclose her as the boys have been. So their lives will continue this way until they both die of natural causes.

    When we farewelled our largely disinterested furry friends, we caught the gondola down again. Those of us who entered the gondola early, became dismayed by the number of people joining us. After all, we were hanging on a steel cable! More and more poured in and then we saw the sign above the door "Licensed to carry 95 plus one people" That is 95 passengers and one driver. We were within the limits but I could not imagine 95 people on board and was pleased when we got to the ground.

    Once down and on the bus again we began a tour around Vancouver. Our first stop was at the Capilano Suspension Bridge. Now, when I hear Capilano , I immediately think of the honey we can get back at home. The one in Vancouver is a name that is a kind of translation from a First Nations man who first held this land. Over time, various people have owned the site but most have maintained or improved on it. Now there are some lovely gardens, a collection of some very fine totem poles and a suspension bridge that is strung across a chasm with a waterfall called "The Plume". This bridge replaced an earlier rope and plank model built by the early peoples, but is still a suspension bridge that requires careful management when crossing the river. It is not for the faint hearted.

    Ross went across to the other side, but I had caught sight of some maple trees that had begun to turn and I was determined to get the colours. When we arrived in Canada we were told this might not happen this year. It had been dry and many of the leaves had dried off rather than changed colour. So, when I saw a few making the change, I knew this to be my next goal for today. I am very pleased that my hunt located several trees in the throes of change and I had a wonderful time selecting and photographing these leaves. They have special significance for me because my Canadian friend, Lorraine's, last message to me before she died, only weeks ago was, "I hope the maples are great for you." Thank you Lorraine. I have the photos. They are dedicated to you.

    Ross, on the other side of the chasm was learning about two more interesting wildlife stories. One is the banana slug. This slug is native to this particular area and lives on the trees in this park. It is bright yellow and can be as much as 30 cms long. The dry weather had sent them into the undergrowth, so here we were, not getting photos again. They sound quite distasteful! The second story was one where the Irish tour guide said they had to close the park recently because the trout in the pond had attracted a young black bear that was now sitting in the pond catching and eating a delicious meal. He could see no reason to move away from this feast and eventually had to be chivvied away so the park could open.

    Our bus tour resumed after lunch and took us through Stanley Park. This is a large and very popular park. Many public amenities are drawn to this area and the people were there in numbers. It is liberally sprinkled with statues, but the best set of statues I saw were by the waterfront. It was a series of about 14 chrome statues of a laughing man. It was the same man with a cartoonish face but each element of the installation showed him in a different position, all clearly laughing. I missed the artist's name, but it was very popular when first installed, so that when offered to the community for $1m and the government couldn't justify the expense, a philanthropic couple bought it for the community. I really enjoyed it and I think if I lived in Vancouver, I might visit it too. (added later, artist was Yue Minjun)

    We also drove through a region in the city called Gastown. All sorts of things popped into my mind about the potential origins of this name, but it turns out, an early resident was called Gassy Jack Deighton and the name eventually morphed into Gastown. I still don't think I would like to live there. Imagine your address. Yes, I live at 4 Bloated Place, Gastown. I think not.

    By 2.30 we were all tired. Ross and I were particularly tired because our neighbours in the room next door were particularly roudy, rude and I suspect a bit violent last night. They were a group of males who seem to have arrived somewhat under the weather and had got to the pushing and shoving stage. They eventually settled down at about 1 am, but our sleep was compromised. By 2.30 this afternoon I was in need of a nap. Ross went to the Post Office to send home a package of souvenirs we had decided not to continue carrying, while I tried to nap. When he got home I got up and did some drafting of today's blog while he napped.

    By dinnertime, our farewell to Canada dinner, we were both a little more refreshed and able to enjoy the company of our fellow travellers.

    Tomorrow takes us on board our boat for Alaska. We have been warned that because it is in American waters, the border security will be tight and lengthy, including the taking of fingerprints. I feel a little resentful of this intrusion but accept that this level of security is a price that must be paid for the tiny few who wish us ill, and the mighty power behind ensuring that they do not succeed. Now it is time for bed. I am a little concerned that already the residents of the room next door are making loud noises. Can we be so unlucky as to get two such neighbours in two nights?    Read more

  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    Day 15

    North to Alaska

    September 6, 2018 ⋅ ☀️ 23 °C

    Today was really an administrative kind of day. After breakfast we got on our bus for the last time and headed for the shipping terminus. A walk, followed by a seated waiting time, a check in, followed by a walk, followed by security, followed by another walk, and a long wait in a queue for the Americans to approve our entry, then another walk and a second time in a seated waiting area. Another hour and we were permitted to cross the gangplank of the Island Princess. We had arrived.

    It didn't take us long to find our cabin which is quite comfortable and has a balcony. I had hoped for a starboard side cabin and got a port, but if I want to see the other side there are plenty of places to grab a comfy seat and watch the world go by. We did sail by a large pile of yellow material on a dock. This was sulphur. It is exported in some quantity for chemical and manufacturing purposes.

    We both settled in to our cabin and checked out its features, including the safety message on the TV. This will mean nothing to the younger generation, but those who remember the 70s TV series "The Love Boat" would be amazed that they have found so many of the original cast still alive. Captain Stubbing, his daughter Vicky, Isaac the bartender, and Doc explained what to do if the ship starts to sink, backed by a Jack Jones impersonator singing the classic show theme. I'm not sure if I remember the safety drill, but the presentation is burned in my memory.

    We had a practice emergency drill then set about finding the restaurants and shops. The Casino was ghastly as all casinos are and I will happily give it a wide berth. The outside swimming pool area has an enormous screen for showing movies at night. It blared away most of the day so I didn't wait there. I found a quiet lounge deck with lounge chairs looking out over the ocean and we parked ourselves there to watch the ship leave harbour. It was very relaxing. Unfortunately, the smoke from the fires hangs heavily over the ocean here and the coastline was barely visible. Being from Belgrave, we fully understand the notion of fire and I have only sympathy for the people. What had been a glorious day with unexpectedly warm and clean air, had become laden with a brown haze as the smoke wafted through from the fire zone. It is some distance from us, so we are in no danger at all.

    As we sat and watched the world go by, we contemplated what would go into today's blog. We began making a list of the things that had been left out from earlier days, because of space or time, and felt that today' s entry would certainly give us this good catch up time. So here we go.

    1. The slug we mentioned yesterday was more interesting than Ross led me to believe. It turns out that this 30 cm yellow slime creature has 20 thousand teeth! That seems extremely excessive to me. It would make being a dentist to slugs a highly lucrative business. Additionally, its slime is so thick that the creature can ooze across a sharp knife without cutting itself. This didn't surprise me so much. The relative size of the slug and the knife would have meant that knife would not have been a issue, but the guide felt it necessary to stress this.

    2. The original owner of the Capilano Park was a First Nations man. He and his family were well established. His mother, a woman in her 90s would go fishing each day, then paddle her catch across the waters to the village to sell. This caused concern for her family. She was getting too old. So one day they took her canoe away from her. She was not pleased! That canoe has now disintegrated but a similar replacement has been made and is now on display. It is still amazing to think such a thing could be made with such primitive tools and that a 90 plus year old woman could manage this heavy object all by herself. After all it was made from a hollowed out tree.

    3. This part of Canada is heavily treed. At first it looks like pine trees everywhere but if you pause by the side of the road or rail line you can see as many as six or seven different kinds of conifer leaf or needle. The tree that has been attacked by the voracious beetle is called the Lodge Pole Pine, presumably after the use it was put to by the early settlers. It is still the one most harvested because it is so straight. After that there are other forms of pine, fir, spruce and then there are other, deciduous trees. Some stand straight and tall with upward pointing branches while others, with a more silvery foliage drape down and are more fullsome in their coverage. They are clearly firs because they are so much like the Christmas tree. Others have thicker trunks, more sparse foliage and a spreading habit in their branches. They look to be spruce.

    At lower altitudes we see lots of silver birch and aspen. These are a strong contrast to the darkness of the conifers. They have white and silvery trunks and light green leaves. In some places there is the hint of change in their colour as they begin their autumnal phase. The leaves flutter and shimmer in the lightest breeze like nervous butterflies. When individuals of these varieties poke their heads through the dark conifers they create a striking contrast.

    Other trees in the region include the Western Red Cedar. Some claim it to be the Provincial Tree. This tree is highly regarded as a forested product and also by the indigenous people who called it the tree of life because they used it to make canoes, instruments, baskets, blankets and even 'diapers'. It drinks five bathtubs full of water a day to survive.

    The hemlock tree is nothing like the hemlock plant that killed off old Socrates. This one is used as a medicinal tree and provides a tea that is considered good for people to drink. Socrates should have chosen this one over the other.

    A Douglas Fir in Capilano Park was 205 feet high, 20 feet in circumferance and was considered to be somewhere between 400 and 800 years old. But the biggest tree in this park was the Western Maple which is somewhere between 800 and 1200 years old. They cannot be more precise than that without either drilling a hole in the tree or cutting it down, neither of which they are prepared to do. This means that this tree may well have been around at the time of the collapse of the Roman Empire. Quite remarkable.

    There are many kinds of maple too. The Eastern maple is the one represented on the Canadian flag. It also produces the better maple syrup. The tree produces sugars in its sap to combat the cold and to stop the sap from freezing and killing the tree. We tap this sap, catch it in a bucket then heat it to remove any nasties. It is absolutely delicious. The Western maples come in different leaf types from the large, broad faced leaf to the smaller, narrower leaf similar to the oriental maple. These types still produce the syrup but it is not as sweet because the climate is not as cold.

    4. Water. The people here keep telling us about the lack of water they have been experiencing. This too must be relative. Just about everywhere we have been there are lakes, rivers, ponds, bogs and puddles, rushing, drifting, seeping or just lying there, wet and soggy. Some of the bog lands were the work of beavers, but much of the water is naturally what is there as part of the regular environment. Certainly, there was the dry area around Kamloops where the sage brush is prolific and the occasional lawn showed signs of drying off after the summer sun, but everything else looked very lush.

    5. Totem poles. These are not religious as the first missionaries thought, but memorials, or family crests, humorous jokes or statements of important events or stories. The story concept is the most frequent. One story we heard was of a giant who discovered an interest in eating young human flesh. He stole two children and began preparing to eat them. The parents of the children were not happy about this and rescued their children from the giant. To punish the giant they set fire to it and killed it. Bits of the flesh of the giant flew up into the air, getting lighter and lighter until they turned into the mosquitoes which came back down in vast quantities to sting and feed on the humans. The moral, we are told, is that we need to be careful of the consequences of our actions. All our best intentions may have consequence we cannot foresee and which we may live to regret. I don't think we should read this as a need to feed children to giants to avoid annoying insects, because I think we would regard that as not good, no matter the outcome. If the giant had liked the taste of children then the consequences may have been more dire.

    Totem poles are the art form of the coastal peoples and are relatively recent in their history. Missionaries mistook the poles as idols and persuaded, cajoled, forced the people to destroy them. This was probably not so absolutely terrible because, being made of wood and kept outside, they were going to rot. The real problem was in refusing to allow them to build any more. The art very nearly died out. A few elders were able to pass on the craft and now there is a resurgence in their creation. It has been appropriated by more and more regions, probably because of the tourist trade, but at least the knowledge is active and being passed on, even if it is not by the original creators.

    The notion that the bottom of the totem pole is the lowest rank is, in fact, quite wrong. The most important is at the bottom, at eyeline, where everyone can see and admire the handiwork. The top can be done with a little less accuracy or flair because almost no-one would see it. Something to remember when using that aphorism in the future.

    This brings us to the end of the day. We had dinner in the Bordeaux Restaurant with some other folk from the tour, then hit bed, ready for a lovely night's sleep. The bed is very cushiony. I am hoping it will be cosy and restful. Tomorrow I hope to be able to wake up to see some of the islands as we pass through the straits.

    We understand that wifi is well nigh impossible on board unless you go to the internet cafe where they charge a dollar a minute. I will upload and check emails in rapid time today.    Read more

  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    Day 16

    Sailing the high seas

    September 7, 2018 ⋅ 🌧 16 °C

    Today's blog entry will be very short. We have travelled several hundred kilometres towards Alaska, without doing very much at all. When I woke early this morning I stepped out onto the balcony to see what was happening outside. From the bed I couldn't make out anything at all. When I opened the door I realised why I was unable to see anything. We were in a thick fog and nothing was visible. I went back to bed.

    About an hour or so later I did the same thing. This time the fog had lifted and I could see a range of islands alongside. I watched for a while then went inside and got dressed more warmly and was out again. In the far distance I saw a movement and watched as this tiny dot became a boat heading straight for us. As it got closer it turned to parallel its run with ours. With the help of the zoom lens on my camera I made out that I was looking at a pilot boat and we were making our way through the Narrows with their assistance. A few buoys, a few lighthouses and lots of water later, the pilot boat began slipping behind us and moving around to the other side of our ship. That was when I noticed the dolphins following the pilot boat. I enjoyed watching them until the pilot boat had moved out of view. That was going to have to be animal sighting number one today. We were going to be sailing all day.

    Ross got up and joined me on our balcony but was not particularly interested in watching us plough through the waves. Then I pointed out that off the ship by several hundred yards was a pod of whales. We did not see the whales in particular, but the plumes of their blows were frequent and represented quite a group of animals. Given the number, I am guessing they were orca. Humpbacks don't travel in such numbers and the frequency of the puffs into the air suggested there were some young ones in the group. We watched them for a few minutes and then they were gone. That was wildlife sighting number two.

    There were no more for the day. I skipped breakfast but did a load of washing. Ross went to the internet cafe after his breakfast to find out about the football scores. He came back happy, then set about doing his washing. Feeding coins into the machine, shifting things from washer to dryer then bringing them back to the cabin to sort them out, eventually took us through to lunchtime. I just had to call in to the internet cafe to send off yesterday's blog. There is no wifi in the rooms and very slow wifi from one location. You pay 79 cents a minute and the shortest transaction is about 5 minutes because of the speed. An expensive activity.

    Lunch was in the Bordeaux room and too fancy again. The food was lovely but I was craving ordinary. After lunch we both did some wandering around the ship for a while, picking up one or two small mementos then back to the cabin. Napping seems to have been a common feature for many of us in the tour. It just caught up with all of us today. The bed rest was delicious. I think Ross had three naps today. That is even more than normal. He has had a cough so the extra rest helped him with that too.

    Tonight was a black tie dinner but we just couldn't be bothered. We went off to the cheap buffet restaurant which did not have a fancy dress code for the evening. We met some people at the lift who had decided to do the same. By the time we got to the right floor we found yet another couple and together we had good quality plain and simple food. A relief.

    We chatted away for a couple of hours, during which time we saw two more cruise ships heading the other way. I was pleased we were not going in the same direction. Some of our stopovers are in small communities and just one cruise ship floods the village. Two would take away all the authenticity.

    Back in our cabin after dinner I looked out the window to see the fog come down again. We went through the internal mail in our cabin letter box and I began writing. Ross fell asleep. Not an exciting day but it met our needs. Tomorrow there are several things planned and I need to try get this entry up onto the web. I wonder what treasure await us in Alaska.    Read more

  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    Day 17

    Timely Tlingit

    September 8, 2018 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 14 °C

    A Tlingit village called Hoonah is a tiny hamlet near Icy Strait Point near the mouth of Glacier Bay. It is the last home of the Tlingit people who have been in this part of the world for many centuries. Now there are only a few members of the many original clans. The point where the ship docked at about midday today is the site of the former fish cannery, but which is now heavily dependent on the passing tourist trade. An island, it is not accessible by road, so tourists come by cruise liners or seaplane. We arrive en masse, shop ourselves silly, then get back on the boat and sail away. The people could not have been more friendly or gracious, but it must be hard for them. Ours will be the last cruise ship until the winter is over. In the meantime, the people eke out an existence from what they have grown during the short summer months, plus what they have shot or caught.

    It seems distateful to me but each Tlingit person in the Hoonah village is entitled to shoot and eat five black tailed deer a year. Some of the citizens are not able to hunt for themselves so someone can hunt for them. The bus driver, taking us from the Cannery site to Hoonah Village, explained to the big man from Texas who was sitting right behind her, that if they didn't cull the deer each year, the herd would grow so big they would starve to death, or die in the snowdrifts. Well I can understand the former reason, but not the second. Anyway, the population in Hoonah is only a few hundred, and the black tailed deer is far from endangered, so this must be one of those natural balances that it is possible to sustain. The people also fish a great deal and take halibut and salmon in quantities.

    The village is rather rough and ready in its construction, but frankly they only need it to be safe and warm and the rest is window dressing they don't need.

    The history of the place is fascinating. For centuries the people lived further up Glacier Bay but the glaciers grew so big that it forced them to move further away from their ancestral lands. This was really only about two hundred years ago. The diaries of the British naval personnel mapping the area, such as Captain Vancouver and a young Lieutenant Bligh, commented that they found the pass virtually impenetrable because the glacier was up to a hundred feet thick. It is now a long way back and cruise ships can make their way many kilometres up the path of the former glacier. As we know, young Bligh went on to be a difficult captain and then controversial Governor of Australia, so it did not take a long time for the glacier to shrink back into the mountains.

    The Tlingit people did make an attempt to go back to their ancestral home but Teddy Roosevelt and his exploring companions declared it a national park and so they stayed put. The government aided them during the process so there is little acrimony. The old site is still recognised by the state and totem poles have been set in place to tell the story.

    Once in Hoonah, (pronounced with a gutteral ch at the beginning)we wandered around the village. There is not a lot there, but one of the most fascinating things was seeing two Tlingit men carving a totem pole. It has been commissioned and they will be working on it for a further seven months. The piece of Yellow Cedar which the pole is made from, cost $15,000. Both men have long traditions within the culture. One man, the main sculptor, has clanship with the octopus, while his assistant is a very rare thunderbird man.

    Stories like this are present in many cultures as we hear of certain clans or tribes disappearing. People with the heritage leave it behind and move away to become part of the dominant culture. One of the girls working in a gift shop explained to another customer that National Geographic visited last year to ask for DNA from everyone so they could begin to track and codify the origins and movements of these people. There was a suggestion of links to peoples from eastern Russian via the Bering Straits as well as many others.

    We were lucky to be able to listen to these stories and watch the men create this fantastic sculpture. It was difficult to photo such a large object with small features all over it, especially as it was lying down. I did manage to capture the very interesting face of the Thunderbird man.

    Equally difficult to photograph were the eagles that live in this area. They sit high up in the spruce and cedar trees and use their extraordinary eyesight to hunt for fish and small animals. They always seem to be just too far away for a clear picture. One has been sitting in the trees near me for some time now. I can see his white head and tail, and when I zoom in on my camera, I can clearly make him out. At such distance, the photo though is quite blurry.

    This morning, before we headed off on our shore excursion we went to a lecture in the Princess Theatre. It was given by the on-board marine biologist and it was on whales. Most of what he had to say was familiar. I have been watching David Attenborough for a very long time. However, his remarks made me rethink my spotting of orca the other day. The blows were not orca blows but humpback blows. They were the wrong shape and size for orca. So, that was pretty good news.

    Today, as we watched our ship dock, I noticed a disturbance in the water. There was obviously a small group of something coming up behind the boat. My first thought was dolphins. They like to follow ships and play near them. However, they did not rise out of the water in dolphin fashion so we just kept watching. It seemed they had lost interest and gone until I saw a splash and it was gone. Then again,.... and again. Each time was in a different place so we could not get a good view. Finally, I got my camera ready, pressed the button down half way and waited. There it was. I replayed the image and enlarged it. It was a seal. From then on we saw his nose peeking up at regular intervals and then the occasional roll. He was clearly entertaining us. After a while he rejoined his group and went back out to sea.

    That makes a seal, an eagle, and finally there was some unusual behaviour from the gulls. All of a sudden they started making a lot of noise and gathering below the pier. I watched closely and then noticed them all pecking at the barnacles on the base of the pylons. They were having lunch and it was going to be a rowdy party.

    So our quota for today has been met, yet again. We have indeed been blessed.

    It is my intention in the next couple of days to take some photos of life on the ship. Everything is very fancy with decorations and fine fittings. It seems odd indeed to be on the ocean and having people wearing their fine jewellery and high heels. I have managed to avoid the excesses, but some are revelling in it.

    Tomorrow we arrive in Juneau, the capital of Alaska. I wonder what we will find when we arrive at 8 am tomorrow.    Read more

  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    1
    Day 18

    Not your usual vegetables!

    September 9, 2018 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 19 °C

    Today we came across yam, turnip, parsnip, rutibaga and some other similarly named things, but not one of them was a vegetable. You will have to read your way through this blog to try to work out the answer to this puzzle.

    When I woke up this morning to stretch my legs on the balcony of our stateroom I saw the sun warming the tops of the peaks of some lower mountains just outside Juneau. It looked like it was going to be a lovely day. Yesterday, had rained on and off for most of the day but it was not so heavy as to cause us to stop seeing the sights. Today, looked like it was going to be ideal for seeing what Juneau has to offer.

    Juneau is the capital city of Alaska but it is actually very small. It has a total population of about 30 thousand people and during the winter this goes down as some of the people working here for tourism head south or into the mountains for skiing. It got its name from one of the two early prospectors who came looking for gold. He and his friend, Harris, befriended the local natives who showed them around. They discovered gold in big nuggets and made their fortune. People flocked to the new town, Harrisburg, named after Harris. Some time later, after Harris had left the town, the community began to think about another name for the growing town. On voting night, held in the Red Dog Saloon, the vote was about to take place, when Joe Juneau bought everyone a round of drinks. The decision was obvious. The town came to be known as Juneau. There are still hints of this rough and ready approach to things in the town that is trying to be more sophisticated.

    It is a pleasant little town but where Melbourne would have a coffee shop every second or third shop, this place had jewellery stores one after the other, all spruiking for the tourists with offers of special deals and gifts for the pretty lady. I managed to resist all such offers. Even prices offered at 80 % discount did not attract me. It was all too intense. The other shops were souvenir shops, or shops selling animal fur products. Ross wasn't feeling well after we finished the short bus ride around the city so I thought we should stop for coffee to let him settle and have a comforting drink. We saw a shop and went to it. It was just a booth and had no seating and Ross did not want to drink his coffee on a park bench, so we walked. And walked and walked. I was tired and achy and over the hard sell as we walked passed all the shops. My tired feet and sore back just wanted to take it easy today. Eventually we ended up at the one place I had remarked was not a place I wished to visit. It seemed to be the only place to sit down for a drink. It was the Red Dog Saloon, the same one where the vote for town name was made.

    It was set up to look like a saloon from the gold rush period. You entered through swing doors and took a seat by scraping your chair legs through the sawdust on the floor. Soon afterwards, a waitress, wearing a red and black bustier and frilly skirt would come to take your order and suggest you have the house special "a duck fart". This is a very powerful drink and not at all attractive. Given that it was only about 10.30 in the morning it was also a silly time to start drinking "hard liquor". We asked for hot chocolates. These came and were pleasant enough but clearly not part of their usual fare.

    The decor was upsetting. The walls were covered with the stuffed heads of the local animals, moose, beaver, deer, caribou, wolf and bear. It celebrated hunting. This is culturally relevant because hunting and fishing are really big in this part of the world. I was just sad to see the faces of these creatures watching me drink my hot chocolate. Over the bar was a framed gun, claiming to be that belonging to Wyatt Earp, who had checked it at the bar, but failed to reclaim it on his way to Nome. I wanted to get out of there. Not my kind of place.

    This meant quite a long walk back to the point where our next excursion would depart and the weather had begun to change. A strong wind, we later heard called a Tunka wind, sprang up and brought some rain with it. We walked along the boardwalk running alongside the inlet, stopping every now and then.

    Knowing we would either have an early lunch or a very late one, we just looked about for a cafe/restaurant that might do us a bucket of chips or something similar. We couldn't find one anywhere. Everyone wanted to sell us crab or salmon. That was just too rich for us and we have been eating quite a bit of this kind of food recently. We thought we had found a place that would sell us a side order of chips, so sat down. When we ordered, they said the side order was for potato crisps, not hot chips. So, we ordered Cajun flavored halibut fish tacos which is a mixed up dish if ever there was one. It was served with coleslaw that had pineapple in it. A strange meal indeed.

    We eventually made it back to our excursion point but my back and legs were very sore. Despite this, I was not going to forego our excursion. I am very glad we stuck it out.

    We got into a small minibus that took us off-road for a couple of kilometres. We pulled up just beside some black tailed deer who were a bit indignant at being disturbed and gave us some dirty looks. I got a picture of one through the van window.

    Several people were disturbed by the roughness of the road, but I felt it was just an ordinary dirt track. They aint seen rough until they have seen Australian rough. We slowed down as we passed the old gold mine that brought a lot of prosperity to this part of the world back in the 1800s, and then on to our destination.

    We were visiting the summer conditioning camp for the dogs that pull sleds through the snow. Part of their conditioning during the summer months is to pull a wheel based sled for a couple of kilometers each day. We were to be the passengers in their dog sled.

    Every dog has its own kennel and just enough chain to keep them from their neighbour. These dogs are highly trained and very friendly, but they are also very excitable and prone to fighting among themselves in their exuberance. We were taken to the special sled and the dogs were brought in and lined up. When they saw us get into the sled, the relative calm disappeared. The closer we came to leaving, the more excited they became. Soon the noise just exploded. There was barking, yelping and howling and that was not just from our sled dogs. Every dog in the place, and that was over a hundred, joined in. Some were frustrated at not having been harnessed yet. Some were cranky with their running partner for being in the wrong spot and every dog, not harnessed to our sled, was barking and howling at being excluded. It was wild.

    When it was time to start, they were off. They just pulled and pulled. They wanted it so badly. At one point the lead dog began to take a right turn but a call from the "musher", (the driver), " Go straight" and the whole pack returned to the straight path. It was exciting to watch. A call and a wayward dog would be brought back into focus. Nothing stopped them running! For future reference, "Yee" means go left and "Haw" means go right.

    The people sitting just in front of us, squealed out at one stage and couldn't stop laughing. When they settled down they told us that a dog just in front of them had gone to the toilet. No stopping of course. The dog picked up his hind legs, did his poo, then dropped his back legs down again and continued running without missing a beat. He had run for some distance on his front legs. These crazy loud Americans kept calling on this dog to "Do it again!"

    After a return journey of about a couple of kilometres we ended up back at the camp. We were invited to pat the dogs. I did not need to be asked twice. I approached them appropriately and then patted them. They enjoyed the pats, but they were panting madly and their eyes did not show the pleasure we see in domestic dogs when you pat them. They would come for the pat but the eyes said they were somewhere else. I was very pleased to be able to pat the lead dog and I congratulated him on his fine work. He was covered in a lather and his tongue hung down lower than any other dog I have seen.

    They don't enjoy the heat so much. I was wearing a puffy jacket and was pleased I was wearing it as the wind blew over the nearby glacier and snowfields. The dogs though, prefer temperatures at about 40 degrees below freezing. At these temperatures, and on snow, they can run 100 miles a day, then get excited at the prospect of doing it again the next day and they will do this for nine days in a row before a break. They are certainly resilient creatures.

    These dogs were then freed from their harness and they raced back to their own kennels without treading on anyone else's territory. There is a risk in crossing the boundaries and food is associated with their kennel so it is a good place to be.

    We were then taken to some displays of the history of dog sledding. In one cabin, I was met by a squirrel, who looked at me, tried to decide whether he should stay or go, then turned tail and ran away. I would not have complained had he stayed.

    After this we were taken to meet the puppies. These ones were only about 6 weeks old and very cute. They were all named after root vegetables which seemed undignified to me. We were encouraged to cuddle them and pass them around so as to socialise them, but after a while they got tired and began calling for their mum. I had enjoyed the cuddles but was pleased to see them reunited with their mother.

    None of the dogs could be really said to be "pretty" dogs. It was explained that they had been bred out of any and all strong pulling dogs and were deliberately bred as mutts. Our driver explained that the beautiful huskies are like the fashion models, but inbreeding and close breeding led to health issues. These Alaskan sled dogs were robust, healthy and stronger pulling dogs. They were more like the athletes. Their hair is rough and although fed an excellent, high protein, high fat diet to help them with their work, they were not pampered dogs and they were all very lean. The Alaskans insist they are the best dogs for this work. I am inclined to agree on principle, although I have no other evidence.

    On retirement, which could be as old as thirteen, the dogs became pets, but still kept outside as befitted their upbringing.

    We returned to our ship exhausted, but delighted by our trip. We both had naps to get the chill and the crinks out of the bones before we had dinner.

    At dinner, one set of guests at our table said they had got up at 3 am to search for the Aurora Borealis which they had been told might appear. I was horrified. What if it had been there and I had not seen it.? Fortunately the Aurora did not show last night. When night fell I went out onto the balcony to check. No sign! I will certainly be checking for it during the night. I won't miss this if I can.    Read more

  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    Day 19

    The Smiths in Skagway

    September 10, 2018 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 18 °C

    We come to the end of another day in Icy Alaska. When we first joined this tour, our tour guide, Bill asked us to set up a weather committee to see to it that we had good weather while we were in Canada and Alaska. We have clearly been doing a great job. Today in Skagway, with a permanent residency of just a couple of hundred people, we had sunshine, light breezes and reasonably clear skies. On running in to Bill while out and about today, he commented he has never taken a tour that had been so blessed with good weather.

    We learned from one of our bus drivers today that Juneau, where we had been yesterday, had had such bad weather today that ships could not come and go. That was why two other cruise ships had joined us in Skagway. When we arrived here we were the only visitors. That was 1000 more people in town than live there. Later in the day when the second and third ships arrived and everybody had disembarked, there were 3000 more people in town. By that time we felt we had seen what Skagway had to offer and were returning to our ship. It was like salmon swimming against the stream. Thousands streamed towards us and we fought our way through them till we got on our gangplank, through the security gates and back to our cabin. Our timing was excellent. Skagway would have been awash with people.

    Our trip into town began with a fun bus ride in an old school bus, led by an amusing and somewhat dry young woman called Valerie. The sites included the church, the former brothels, the bars, the icecream shop, a lemonade stand set up by children in a back street, the home of her ex-boyfriend, and the back yard of the minister of the First Presbyterian church who had been gutting a large halibut this morning and she was wondering when the barbecue would be starting. It was like taking a tour through a private house. We were shown the gardens of a nice old lady who grows lovely dahlias, someone who likes trains and the day care centre that cares for the very young and the very old in town. Nothing was off limits.

    She told a story, and she and the woman who drove the second bus, acted bits of it out for us in an amusing little play. It was about someone of interest, a real scoundrel. But I have asked Ross to retell this story. Here he goes...

    The lure of gold brought more than just honest miners and foolish adventurers to Skagway Alaska: it brought conmen like Soapy Smith, who preyed on the gullible. Now, I have no reason to believe that Soapy is a relative, but part of me wishes he were, because my family tree is in need of such colourful characters.

    Jefferson Randolph Smith earned the name "Soapy" in his early years in the 1870 - 80s in Denver running the "soap game" scam. On a street corner he would open a box of wrapped soaps. He would make a big deal about unwrapping some soaps and placing money inside the wrapper, before rewrapping the soaps, and starting an auction. The first soap would be sold at an inflated price at auction, with the excited purchaser unwrapping the soap to find a $100 bill. Then the auction would take off. What the crowd did not realise of course was that every time that money was found, the purchaser was actually one of Soapy's colleagues who had been signalled to bid.

    Now, where was a bright young man like Soapy to go: The goldfields in the Klondike.

    In 1897 and 1898, Soapy and his gang of over 100 thugs ruled Skagway. Soapy ran crooked gambling halls, freight companies that hauled nothing, a telegraph company that had no lines out to the rest of the world, and an army enlistment tent where the victim's clothes and possessions were stolen while he was being checked by the "doctor". His men met newcomers at the docks, posing as clergymen, reporters, and knowledgable freight company representatives. He ran a parlour that would lure newcomers in with the promise that they could see the eagle he kept inside, only to be robbed. The thief would head out the back, being pursued, apparently disappearing into thin air in a completely fenced backyard. There was, of course, a disguised exit through the fence.

    Soapy and his gang met their end in 1898 when they fleeced a miner, returning from the goldfields, of $2800 in nuggets. Instead of slinking away, a beaten man, the miner fired up the citizens of Skagway to clean up the town. A meeting was called, held eventually at the end of the jetty, somewhere near where the cruise ships now come in. Four men were placed on guard to keep undesirables such as Soapy out.

    Soapy got wind of this, and after a day of heavy drinking, headed down there armed with his trusty Winchester rifle, only to be stopped by the four men, including a Mr Frank Reid, a civil engineer. In the confrontation that followed, four shots were fired: one by Soapy that struck Frank Reid in what we might delicately call "the groin", and three by Mr Reid, one of these piercing Soapy's heart killing him instantly. Soapy's body was left there for several days until some of the townswomen petitioned the authorities to have it carried away. Frank Reid was whisked away, a hero, to the infirmary, only to die a painful death 12 days later when the wound became infected.

    A postscript to the story. The grateful citizens built an imposing monument to Mr Reid in the the gold rush cemetery that we visited. About 10 metres away is the grave of Soapy. So incensed were the citizens of Skagway, that a municipal order was given to excise Soapy's grave from the consecrated ground of the cemetery. They did so, without shifting his grave, by redrawing the boundaries of the cementery, with his grave just outside the new borders.

    It was also subsequently discoved that Frank Reid may not have been quite the upright citizen, possibly being wanted for two murders back in America.

    That was Ross' piece.

    After throwing him this challenge, he was a force to be reckoned with. He sought out local experts, visited the local museum, watched a 25 minute movie and bought a book on the subject of Soapy Smith. When back on board he took the tablet device and wrote for ages, checking facts and figures on his camera from the museum to make sure he was not going to be as haphazard as me. I explained that it was about getting the idea of it and not being bound by too much detail. He scoffed!

    Anyway, I happily brought in my washing which had been sitting on my balcony and was now dry, read some of the book I bought on the native peoples of Alaska (fascinating) and had a nap. Lots of walking this morning and I am finding the nap very good rebuilding time.

    Skagway is so far away from anywhere else that they don't have much television because the satellite doesn't reach and internet is almost non existent. I overheard a woman in town trying to talk to someone on her phone and the signal kept failing. It would be a challenging place to live for someone who likes technology or who likes to stay in touch with what is happening in the world, but as our bus driver said, this is a town with one woman for every nine men, so life can get very interesting. Just be careful where you park your car overnight because everyone will know in the morning. It must be even more interesting in winter when they can get 23 minutes of direct sunlight a day. We are close to the Arctic circle after all.

    Anyway, we have been told there there is a 3/10 chance of seeing the Aurora tonight. There was none visible last night despite several visits to the balcony during the night. I am fairly certain I will not see it because I think I see the weather from Juneau catching up with us. The clouds are thickening.    Read more

  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    Day 20

    The Princess and the Icebergs

    September 11, 2018 ⋅ ⛅ 14 °C

    We have just been informed that the next five or six days could be even more uncertain regarding the internet. Alaska is a wild frontier country. We have been warned not to expect luxuries such as kettles in rooms or glasses, just paper cups. If this is so, then the internet is likely to be unobtainable. Today, when I went to the onboard Internet Cafe, they had no internet either. It was not until we had sailed out of the narrow passageways between islands, skirted some glaciers and dodged some icebergs that I tried again and was successful. I may get this message out, and maybe tomorrow's but after that, things get considerably worse. I will try, but don't be alarmed if your daily report is not ready for you at the usual time.

    This morning was clear and sunny. Our good luck with the weather continues. We sailed up the inlet with the sun rising and glowing a light pink on the snow capped mountains. There had been no Aurora, as far as I knew, even though I had checked several times. I will try again tonight. At about 10.30 as I watching the water, it occurred to me that by that time of day I would have expected the sun to be much higher in the sky, then I realised that our proximity to the Arctic Circle was revealing itself again and I keep being surprised by it. Before we left Vancouver the weather reporter stated that they are losing three minutes of daylight a day at the moment. This will, of course, slow down, but it is telling.

    We made our way through Glacier Bay and up the fjord which had once been 65 miles of the Grand Pacific Glacier, the same one I mentioned a few days ago, that was explored by George Vancouver and William Bligh. There were quite a few smaller glaciers that had been tributaries of the Grand Pacific and which now all feed into the fjord. The two that were the most remarkable were the Grand Pacific, which was over two miles wide but largely indistinguishable from a big mound of dirt and the Margerie which was startlingly white and very active and only one mile wide. They met, along with a minor third, at a major confluence in Glacier Bay, the head of the fjord. While almost all glaciers in the world today are shrinking, the Margerie is not. It also moves at two metres a day which makes it very fast moving.

    The Grand Pacific appears low (but is not) and very dirty. This comes from the heavy deposits of rock and soil being carried down. It looks like dirt, but is actually heavily laden ice. The icebergs coming from this glacier are less frequent but are black and make the water muddy as they begin to melt.

    The Margerie is very thick, (several hundred metres), and comes from some massive snow and icefields coming from around Mt Root standing at 15,000 feet in the background. The final edge wall of ice is sharp and crumbly and the glacier is very noisy. One noise comes from the cracking ice as it moves down the mountain. This sound is like the cracking of ice cubes in a drink but MUCH bigger. However, the noise that was most remarkable was the boom when a piece of ice broke off and fell into the water. This is called calving. At the distance we were, the delay between the break and the sound reaching us was a couple of seconds. That should clarify the distance between us and the edge, but honestly it felt like only about 20 metres away. The proportions were quite misleading. Our ship is enormous, with about 1300 people on board, and it was dwarfed by the glacier.

    While we sat there watching this mountain of ice, it calved about five or six times, booming away, sending up sprays of water 20 or 30 metres in the air, then sending ripples through the water. This was followed up by small parts of the ice forming an icy slush and the larger pieces forming small icebergs. We were surrounded by icebergs and slush. It felt like we were the piece of fruit on top of a slushie! Some of these icebergs found their way out of the fjord, 65 miles and more, away from their birthplace. This would have taken many hours drifting along before they eventually melted away. You could stand on them but it would have been extremely unwise.

    We managed to capture several calvings, but unless you see them in sequence, the impact is less dramatic. The image looks insignificant, but if you had been under the smallest collapse you would be dead from the impact. Quite majestic.

    The captain took us to the glacier and then he spun the ship round so no-one would miss out. I was standing at the bow of the ship taking photos and grabbing vantage points when I could. When he began the spin, I hightailed it two thirds down the length of the ship and down five floors to get to our cabin so I could take photos from that vantage point. No jostling for space on our balcony. I made it in time!

    Later in the day, we had to get dressed up for a Cocktail Party put on by the tour company. It was pleasant, but odd. We caught up with several people we had got to know and had drinks and canapes. After an hour we excused ourselves to try sort out seating on planes in a few days and to send off yesterday's blog.

    As I settle in for the evening and finish off this blog, I can say that I just saw an amazing sunset. Nothing was in the way, not even a cloud, as the sun set over the open ocean. It was very late in the evening. Getting ready for Aurora spotting now!    Read more

  • TravelerMeandering through maples
    Day 21

    A College of Wet

    September 12, 2018 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

    Pardon the pun in the title. Not a "College of wit" so much as "wet", but even the wet was hard and cold with more glaciers than you could poke a stick at. I lost track of the number and we were told that there are so many that quite a few do not have names. The big glaciers all have names. All the glaciers on the left hand side of this latest fjord as you enter it, are all named after prestigious women's colleges in the US, and the ones on the right are named after the men's colleges, as they were traditionally known. That is why it is called College Fjord.

    The really big one was Harvard, closely followed by Yale. It was pointed out that the team of highly educated scholars who claimed and named the fjord thought it was a jolly jape to exclude Princeton. Ross was incensed. Harvard and Princeton have always maintained a parochial disharmony, but he really resented the exclusion of Princeton with its greater focus on the sciences and where Einstein was. He overcame his annoyance though as we got closer to the Harvard Glacier which is absolutely enormous.

    We thought that this glacier would not calve for us. We couldn't be that lucky two days in a row. We watched it for a long time then, as the crowds grew, we went inside to have our dinner. The sun was disappearing and it was really getting cold outside so we congratulated ourselves on our cleverness.

    After dinner we went back to our cabin. It was on the port side and the ship was slowly spinning to give everyone a good look of the glacier and we realised we would get a fantastic view from our balcony. We were right. No sooner had we arrived and positioned ourselves than we heard the now familiar cracking, like a gun shot, then the rumbles and roars. The glacier had begun to calve. We snapped some pictures but so much is lost from still photos of ice falling against an icy backdrop. We both pressed the video buttons on our cameras and caught footage of several calvings. Quite spectacular. One of the early ones delivered the biggest iceberg of the day. It was a murky colour but created quite a splash, then wave after wave of ripples before settling in the slush and beginning its journey down the fjord.

    But I started today's blog with the end of it, so will go back to the beginning of the day. It was a sailing day with no stopovers, so people began their days slowly. It was also our last full day on board ship so there were disembarkation meetings to take us through the order of tomorrow.

    After these were over, we went about looking at things, taking in the vastness of the ocean, chatting with fellow travellers and pretending to go on a bar crawl. There are several bars on board. By the end of today we had been in the Explorers bar, the Crooners Bar, the Calypso Cove Bar and the Wheelhouse Bar (which we nicknamed the Wheelbarrow Bar) but had resisted the Churchill Bar because that was the smokers bar. We missed out on the Bayou Bar but didn't feel we had missed much. They were all pretty much the same, despite decor change, and when you only drink club soda or iced tea there isn't much to say.

    It struck us as very odd to see people serving and drinking alcohol as early as 10 am and seeing nothing wrong with it. We didn't see anyone drunk all trip so that was good.

    Today we also visited the Wedding Chapel (for the disembarkation meeting) and the Library. The most common practice in the library was jigsaw building and playing card games. There were some readers too. We never once entered the casino which looked dark and sinister. The noise coming out of it was troubling too. We are in Alaska, on the high seas, visiting exotic places and seeing wondrous sites and people were playing bingo.

    This afternoon we repacked our bags. We must have them outside our cabin doors by 10 pm so they can be transported off the ship in the early hours, loaded on trucks and taken through Whittier and on to Anchorage which is our next stop. We must put our overnight stuff in backpacks.

    Whittier is an odd place and we will only be there a short time. The total population of this town is 187 people and they all live in a single highrise building. This puzzled me at first. Why wouldn't they have separate homes? Well it makes sense to have just one heating system, one set of plumbing and water supply for a town that is really a service centre. It has a school and other essential services such as a grocery store within the building so it is an all purpose building.

    According to our guide, it is always cloudy or raining in Whittier. This was so well known, that the military built a base there in WW2 because the Japanese would never be able to attack it because of the weather. The old military facility is now abandoned and after a fire, now derelict. It is only inhabited by bears who appreciate the ready made hibernation places.

    There is only one road in Whittier and it is both rail and road: it is a tunnel. Being one lane, they have calculated that every hour the direction of the travel reverses. There is no room for people who are a little bit late. They wait an hour before they can head off.

    The fjord we are travelling through at the moment was the site of two great events. The first was in the 1964 when the second largest earthquake ever recorded took place. It disturbed the ground so much that salt water was taken up into the roots of the trees as a result of liquefaction. This killed the trees but left them in their place creating a ghost forest. The town of Valdez disappeared, killing over 30 people.

    The second was more recent, when in 1989 the Exxon Valdez ran aground here. Now that I have seen the site I am even more horrified by what happened. Much of this region is pristine wilderness and it is reasonable to believe that much of it has never been trodden on by humans. It is quite inhospitable. The thousands of gallons of crude oil that spilled out into the area critically endangered many animals. Most have now recovered, including the local sea otter which we saw several times. It is about 30 kilos in weight, more hair on its body per centimetre than any other and swims on its back so his hands can use rocks to crack open shellfish for the flesh. Unfortunately one whale species was virtually exterminated. All the females died and only a handful of males now exist. There was one other creature that died out, but I was so caught up in the tragedy of the whales, I didn't catch its name. The site seems now to have overcome the shock and destruction and the waters are teeming with life.

    As I sign off, I have to admit that despite getting up several times to look for the Aurora, I did not see it when it came at about 10.30 last night. Tonight I have asked for a call when/if it comes. They have assured me that the call will come if the Aurora does. The likelihood tonight is 6/10. I can't wait!    Read more

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