Alaska Part Two

Telling you what the best part of a trip is not only hard but it is so subjective that it really does not convey the information that is meaningful. On this trip, there was really not a best part. The glaciers may be the most dramatic but so many other places and features are great that they make it impossible to grade them from best to worst.

You should remember that you are a visitor and do respect the people and places that you are visiting. Think about the fact that on a modern cruise ship you have so many people and that can over run a small city. On the Alaskan, cruise think about the fact that your ship’s visit to a port can double the population of that city as Skagway for example. Then realize during high season that there may be several cruise ships in port at the same time.

Ketchikan is a great place to start since it will give you a feeling of summer season in the state. It is partially a tourist attraction and partial a small town that uses the tourists as a way to earn extra money during the limited warmer weather season. Remember that the people of Alaska do enjoy all of the seasons and that they see even what others see as cold weather as a reason to enjoy the sunny day. If 45° is cold, think about what could be colder. Do not laugh at people wearing shorts on a day that you have on a heavy coat. They may be doing the more normal thing.

When you are visiting the area you are not going to see it all because no matter how small the towns are, they are part of a very large state and that is the beauty of the trip in that you can see so much and yet you are not going to be crowded. In Ketchikan you can sees the history of the native people since many totem poles are located in that city including at the museum. Hint: a local bus offers free trips around the city and it does go to the totem pole museum. That offers a good way to see more of the area and not need to do much planning. The size of the cruise ships that are now in service will become even more apparent when you are in these small sized ports. The way that the ship dominates the port makes it very apparent. If you are in the high season it is possible that more than one ship will be in port at the same time and that in fact it could be four ships at one time. This means that the population of the town will be vastly different from normal and I suspect will affect the way the locals react to all of the visitors. The number of visitors will probably overwhelm some businesses. They do want the business but they do need cooperation from the customers to actually get any business accomplished.

Juneau is the state capital and when you visit you do initially find it hard to believe that a state capital can have the vibe of a small town and yet the importance of the center of power for a state. The ability of the people of Alaska to accomplish all they do and they do a lot more than most of us think about when we took to the north. It seems that we did get to enjoy the city before the major influx of tourists and so the cities did have a more relaxed atmosphere. We also discovered that if we went to the local library we could get an hour of actual internet time with a speed that was acceptable. On the ship, the internet speed was comparable to that of the glaciers.

When you are in such a small town, it does offer a chance to walk around and check out all of the local merchants without going too far from the ship. This allows you to be more relaxed and maybe shop more. You will need to pack luggage you will need to do so when you get to your final destination. You will go through customs when the cruse ends because of a short stay in Canada. Also, consider that if you have an air segment in your trip you do have the restrictions associated with air travel. Both luggage and TSA rules are so different then on a ship or train.

More in a later segment but I try to keep these blog articles somewhat short. That means that the rest of the trip will come later, including a train trip and a short stay in Canada.

And yes, we did find Waldo.