Aloha Hawaii

Day 36 was pretty much a travel day getting from Calgary to Honolulu. After a 16 hour journey (including a lengthy layover in LA) we landed in Honolulu around 8.30pm. Just enough time for a quick beer with the Toomers in Waikiki before hitting the sack!
Day 37 was another cruisey one just kicking around Waikiki with the family. We have done Waikiki several times before so weren't too fussed on doing anything in particular. We spent some time shopping, lounging by the pool with cocktails and exploring the war museum by the beach. We managed to catch the Friday night fireworks put on by the Hilton on Waikiki Beach which was absolutely packed!
Day 38 was cruise day! We spent a chunk of the day getting to the port and checking on to the boat (Norwegian Pride of America) and getting ourselves oriented with it. It's been fairly recently rennovated and is very OTT American themed. It was a much smaller boat than our cruise line through Alaska, there was no LED screen on the pool deck for movies under the Stars like Princess does, which is a shame as the girls would have loved it. They also dont have a casino on board as gambling is illegal in Hawaii, which isnt a bad thing but it's kind of a cool novelty on the ships we have been on. We all acted in nicely and enjoyed the food and entertainment, although we missed the start of the show as they took almost 3 hours to serve us dinner (just the start of a multitude of service issues onboard).
Day 39 we were straight into our first port, Kahului on the Island of Maui. We were here for 2 days so there was no time pressure. We rented a people mover and the whole whanau went to Lahaina for the day, which is a cute little village about 45 minutes drive on the other side of the Island. We had heard it was good shopping and worth a visit, so we spent most of our first day there. The shops are all on the waterfront so it is really pretty, and loads of arts galleries and outlet type shops. They also have a massive Banyan Tree in the middle of town that was planted in 1873. They are fascinating trees and it looked like we were walking through a park with multiple trees at first, then we realised they were all joined and it was actually all one tree. They send shoots down off their branches that tap into the ground and then over time as they establish they get so big they look like trunks in their own right. On arriving back on the ship we found our rooms all made up with various little towel animals on them. This became a standard every day where it was a different animal, and none of us had the same ones!
Day 40 was our second day in Kahului and most of the family were keen to relax on the ship, so Logan, Hayden and I ventured out to check out the local town that we hadn't seen the day before. It was not particularly exciting, just a couple of shopping malls and a very small beach.....but it is much cheaper to drink off the ship than on, so after laundry and shopping we headed for the pub. We found a massage place in the mall that did massages for a third of the price as on the boat do we thought we would give it a crack. It turned our pretty well....great massage and the first time I have ever had anyone walk on my back and massage my shoulders with their knees lol. We all walked out pretty happy and relaxed so must have been worthwhile.
Today was also Grant's birthday so we all did a show and dinner on the boat as we sailed for the next destination. Dinner was lovely and much faster than the previous time we were in the main restaurant but unfortunately they forgot to bring Grant's cake and do the Happy Birthday song. We were waiting all through dinner and it just never happened. It was meant to be a surprise and there were little birthday parties going on around us as well, so when we asked at the end of the night they said they would deliver it to the room, so we had our own little party there.
We also found out there was a slight change in the schedule for the week. We were supposed to be in Kona, but with the approach of Hurricane Olivia all of the ports were shut down as a precaution so we couldn't get there. They had been following Olivia all week and keeping us updated, by this point it had been downgraded from a Cat 1 to a tropical storm but they were still being cautious. Because of the direction it was heading and the anticipated time of landfall being the following morning, they let us into Nawiliwili (on the Island of Kauai). We would now only have the 1 day in Kauai instead of the 1.5 days and we would miss the afternoon of cruising past the Napali Coast which is supposed to be beautiful, and only visible by plane or boat. The ship then had to scramble to reorganise everyone's shore excursions for the following day and the rest of the week as the whole itinerary ended up being flipped upside down. Some peoples got cancelled but thankfully all of ours managed to be rescheduled.
Day 41 we made it to Nawiliwili and the whole family were off on a tour to Waimea Canyon. Our first stop was Spouting Horn which is basically a blowhole formed by lava tubes. The waves push through the bottom of the rocks and through a connecting hole in the top. There were a couple in the rocks we were looking at going at the same time. We had a brief stop in Hanapele at a little shop that must have been one if the cuzzies so we shot over the road to grab some food at a local deli. They did local Asian and Hawaiian food so along with some ribs Hawaiian style, we got some Lilikoi Pie which the lady serving told us we had to try. We had never heard of it but later in the tour our tour guide mentioned and and told everyone they had to try it. Lilikoi is their local Hawaiian passionfruit and the pie is made from it. It's like a sweet pastry base with a very light filling...almost like cheesecake but not as heavy. Ours had some cream on top which I think was also flavoured with the passionfruit but the whole thing had an extremely delicate flavour, and not really sweet at all! From there it was up the mountain to the canyon. I can liken it to the Grand Canyon only a lot smaller and greener. It's very pretty with many waterfalls, and very red dirt. It is the biggest canyon after the Grand canyon do still a reasonable size, and the area is inspiration for a lot of films including the likes of Avatar.
Because we were only getting the 1 day in Nawilieili we headed into town after the tour to have a look at the tiny beach and tow ship there. There were heaps of surfers and paddle boarders out on foilboards which was quite fascinating to watch. The other thing we noticed in Kauai was the massive number of wild roosters and chickens roaming everywhere (it explains why there was a guy dressed as a giant chicken for us to have photos with when we arrived). Apparently cock fighting was and still is a popular sport in Hawaii. People keep the roosters on cages on their property and some have up to 30. A few years back there was a hurricane that blew through the island and ruined a head of these setups effectively setting huge amounts of roosters free. The population has since exploded and they are also protected so you aren't allowed to eat them.
Day 42 we spent at sea. This was the day the storm was expected to make landfall so for our safety we sailed right out to the west of the islands and towards the south in readiness for Hilo the following day.
Day 43 we were docked in Hilo (on the island of Hawaii) which is the wettest city in America. It always rains, and the day we were there was pretty overcast with a few showers....apparently a fairly normal Hilo day. They had introduced a new tour at the start of the cruise to go to the new lava flow from the July eruption, so we couldn't pass it up! Hawaii (the Island) is made up of 5 volcanoes, and Kilaeua is only the 3rd largest. Of the 5, 2 are active and 1 is erupting. We started off visiting the lava flow from the 2014 eruption which is right by the transfer station. You can see its path right down the valley and where is crossed the road they have cleared it with a bulldozer so you can drive through it. This was quite a hot oozing eruption and you can see where it has oozed, it's quite smooth and easy to walk on. 4 years on there is a pretty reasonable amount of greenery already growing through the cracks - mainly ferns and a few small trees. There is a house still standing in the area that the lava missed on all sides but it has been abandoned as the lava completely surrounded it.
After this we drove over the rift zone of Fissure 8 (what the current eruption is called). The road that goes through it had cracked and they have patched it with steel strips do you can still drive over it. The whole area is steaming still and it looks like a scene from an apocalypse movie. If you follow the steam up the hill you would end up at the Fissure 8 cone.
From there we headed to the coast where the lava flow was dropping into the sea as that has all hardened now. This was quite a different lava flow, a lot cooler so it's not oozing lava, but big chunks of lava being pushed down the mountain. We got to walk over part of it but it is pretty lethal, super sharp and unstable to walk on as it is just oddly shaped loose rock. The area looks pretty desolate as it is so new and it looks a little like the lava fields on Tongariro. Our tour guide happened to be at the crater when it all happened with a tour group! It was pretty interesting hearing it first hand from a local and how much the media hypes things up! They are pretty casual about it all over there, it's just part of life on the Big Island. There was a little place called Uncle Robert's just out of Pahoa which is like a hippy area with little make shift shops and bars with tarpaulin grooves and chilly bins for fridges. The rest of the houses got wiped out by a lava flow in the nineties and Uncle Robert's was the only place that was spared. He had a heap of land, so he invited everyone who lost their homes to share his land. We stopped by the Mauna Loa Macadamia Nut Factory on our way through to Rainbow Falls.....not much interest to us having done all of that in Aussie. Rainbow Falls was pretty, unfortunately there was no sun, which means no rainbows. In the cloudy weather though it creates a mist at the bottom from the water spray as the water has so much power behind it. The water was red and the falls were much wider than normal because of the heavy rainfall from the storm. Apparently the day we were there was windier than it had been all week 🤨
We got back pretty late from our tour so never had the time to go into Hilo township as it was a couple of miles away from the port as we wouldn't have had any time to look around by the time we got there and back. We at least drove through on the tour so got to see some of it, including the remaining damage from Hurricane Lane. Hawaii (the island) also has wild chickens but nowhere near the number in Kauai.....their thing is wild pigs. There are 6 pigs to every human on that island!
We got back to the ship yo a message offering us free dinner and wine at one of the ships fancy pay restaurants as an apology to the situation in our stateroom where we kept loosing hot water. This had been an ongoing saga, at one point we had no hot water for almost 2 days and had to shower at the spa. Anyway, it meant we had a lovely dinner at the steakhouse....our first steak in 7 weeks!
Day 44 was just on the other side of the same island in Kailua-Kona. This is a pretty little town, with the complete opposite weather patterns to Hilo. Hilo is all lava rocks, black sand beaches and rain, where Kona is desert and forest, white sand beaches and sunshine!
We had to tender in to the pier and as soon as we walked down the pier towards town Logan spotted a Green Sea Turtle hanging by the rocks. It's a really quaint little town with lots of random little shopping alleys and markets. Today's tour was to do some hiking. We started off heading to Kaloko-Honokahau National Park to see some old Petroglyphs. This is located in a desert by the beach and boy was it hot!! The sun was beating down at 30°c with no shade and high humidity. The petroglyphs haven't been carbon dated and they are less tha 1000 years old but they are probably from around the time the early European settlers came. They were quite hard to see so we didn't bother trying to catch them on camera. The beach is part of the park and it's where the Green Sea Turtles hang on the beach to dry out and harden their shells, so we saw a couple more of them on the beach and in the water. On that same beach are the remains from the old Hawaiian fish traps that they built out of rocks. They would build them up to water level at low tide and then at high tide the fish would was into the area and be trapped there at the next low tide. The walls would have small holes in them for the smaller fish to get back out, and then they would sort the fish in the sorting ponds, which were also made out of rocks. From the beach we made our way Makala (up the mountain) to the forest. Thus is where the rain and clouds hang. We went hiking in Cloud Forest which is actually someones private property. The guy who owns it is a botanist and planted it all back in the 90s. It's really well established and feels like you are walking in a forest that's been established for hundreds of years! It was a pretty rugged track climbing over trees roots and up and down muddy paths, and then the heavens opened half way through. We had taken wet weather gear but Logan didn't want his do he got drenched. No one else had taken anything so I was the only dry one!
Once we got out of there we went pretty much across the road to Mountain Thunder Coffee Farm. Here we got to do coffee tasting, do a tour of the processing plant and spend a ludicrous amount of money for Kona Coffee. This farm is when all of the coffee growers send their coffee for processing. They have all of the expensive gear do they can do all of it or just bits. They only keep the biggest and best beans to sell and the lower grade beans go to places like McDonalds. Because of the growing climate and the sorting climate Kona Coffee is some of the best in the world.....that's why it's so expensive. It can only be Kona Coffee if it is specifically grown the the Kona region.
The roasting process is pretty interesting...it just like making popcorn, where you roast it and wait for it to crack or pop. This is a light roast, then a dark roast is when it cracks a second time. Medium is when they pull it out between the two cracks and that what they call their cupping blend. The cupping blend is what roasters have to submit to competitions as it is the most flavoursome. The bitter coffee taste is when the coffee is dark roasted or burnt, it's not actually the flavour if the coffee, and it also has the least caffeine in in ad the oils containing the caffeine have been stripped in the roasting process. So you should drink a light roast in the morning to wake you up, and a dark roast at night do it doesn't keep you awake......you learn something new every day! Also coffee is technically a fruit....so it has to be good for you! We had a few drinks in town when we got back to make the most of $4 beers and were the second to last people on the last tender boat of the day!
Day 45 brings us to today......finally time to make our way home 😥 We had cheap flights with Hawaiian where you get your seats assigned at the gate. It can mean you get whatever is left and it's not guaranteed that you will sit together but worked out pretty well for us as what they had left was in Premium Econony....BOOM! That should make our long flight a bit more pleasant!

Photos: https://1drv.ms/f/s!AsbHvsl8mGaZgd9AZm9kqYvnjd4ZOg

Vancouver Eh

Wow....what an amazing week it has been! Canada has offered no opportunity for me to blog so here I go again on the plane! (It's a great way to kill time while flying.)
Days 27 and 28 were pretty well written off as travel days. Both of our flights to get to Vancouver were delayed so on top of the whole flight being changed on us a month or so ago we arrived even later than expected. Between having to do our night in Seattle which was not originally planned be basically lost 1 whole day from Vancouver that was in our original plan. We crammed in as much as we could but missed doing a lot of things in Vancouver as we simply didn't have enough time! It is a lovely city though. After taking over an hour to get through immigration at the airport we jumped on the train to the city that we had sussed out when we did our quick stopover 2 weeks ago. Our hotel was a quaint little 1920s building a few blocks from Stanley Park and a really short walk to English Bay. By the time we had checked in and got ourselves sorted it was already 3pm so we wasted no time in heading straight out. English Bay was our first stop as it was only a 5 minute walk down the road down Denman Street. It's a really cute area with lots of shops and eateries to choose from. There are a heap of massive logs that have been placed on the beach itself to create seats or leaners for people lazing on the beach, and they also have a mat that runs from the boardwalk all the way down to the water for wheelchairs to gain access which is such a great idea!
From the end of English Bay we spotted the water taxis heading over to Granville Island so we jumped on one and headed over to check it out. It is a strange little island that sits under an bridge and is surrounded by marinas. It is super close to the main body of land and is well connected with a vast array of bridges for cars, bikes and pedestrians. That is one thing that struck us about Vancouver in general.is that so many people cycle, and it is really well catered for! Granville Island is very arty, there are lots of boutique bars, eateries, breweries and shops as well as theatres and markets. We had a wander through Granville Island Public Market which was one of the best markets I have been to! It is all food of various forms, similar to the food part of Queen Vic Markets in Melborne but a lot more boutique and much bigger. They have every kind of meat you could ever imagine! They even had some A5 grade Wagu for $199 a pound 😳 We got some handmade fudge at one of the fudgeries which was absolutely divine. Cheese was another specialty with any kind of cheese you could want (except for good old NZ tasty) and fruit we had never seen before. There were various places that were like delis and it was like a pick n mix of olives every way, stuffed peppers, cheeses...pretty much anything you could ever want on an antipasto platter.
We spotted a theatre complex across the road from the markets called The Improv Centre, so headed in for  nosey. Turns out they had a show on that night.....theatresports! The show was 45 minutes away so we zapped across the road to get some famed Poutine before it started. We have never had it before and I have to say we are not really fans. The concept seems good but the combo of the gravy and cheese curds made it super salty! The theatresports was great fun
...it was run in exactly the same way as 'Who's Line is it Anyway?' And as it turns out Colin and Ryan got their start there (Vancouver Theatresports).
By the time we had finished there the water taxis had finished for the night so we made our way home on foot via downtown (quite a hike as it turns out).
As a city it is very multicultural which is something that is distinctly lacking in most American cities. We probably wouldn't have noticed as much if we hadn't been in America for several weeks prior.
Day 29 was Stanley Park exploration. Stanley Park is the biggest city park in the world....bigger than Central Park, but much easier to  navigate than central Park! We hired bikes, and because the park is very flat we got 1 speed, pedal brake cruisers. They are so much more comfortable than mountain bikes! It took a few hours to do the whole perimeter and all of the little spots in the middle...and of course a few beer stops 😉
There are such beautiful views of the harbour and different parts of the city all the way around, and we even called in to see The Fish House where Rach used to work when she lived there. It's all derelict now and looks like they might be tearing down.
The Rockies roadtrip is on it's way...another flight to fill in.

Rockies Roadie

Day 30 marked the start of our Rockies adventure. We were headed for Hope for our first leg, breaking up the driving into bite sized chunks but the biggest chunks were over the first 2 days. We were expecting as we got further into the mountains the roads would narrow and become more windy but that couldn't be more far from the reality! The roads were generally 4 lanes minimum and relatively straight. The speed limit ranged from 90 to 120km per hour so you can imagine what they are like! Once we started getting further from Vancouver gas stations became more scarce so after every little township there would be road signs asking if you have checked your gas....next service 150km! The other signs that dominated the roadside were pictures of various animals to watch out for on the road including deer, moose and mountain goats. A large chunk of the road was either cliffs either side or fenced so the animals couldn't wander on to them but there were some fairly open spaces at times where they could wander, near Calgary there were even signs saying watch for Pedestrians....on the highway!
The trip to Hope was busy as everyone was heading away for Labour weekend over here but the roads flow pretty nicely because they are so good and there are almost always passing lanes. The main focus on the way to Hope was to find somewhere to buy bear spray in preparation for going into the forests to look at the scenery. Our first port of call was Walmart but they were all sold out! From there we tried a sporting goods store as we had left it until we were well out of Vancouver to try and get some and were getting close to our first forest adventure, so ended up paying twice the price! With bear spray in hand (which lived in my handbag on my shoulder for the week) I felt a bit more protected and we headed in to see Bridal Veil Falls. The first thing we spotted when we arrived was bear proof bins so we knew we were in bear country again. It was a really pretty waterfall, aptly named as it flows down graduated rounded rocks like a white veil. We arrived in Hope late afternoon as we had run a few errands in Vancouver in the morning and left quite late. With a population of around 4000 it is quite a quaint little town which consist of 1 min street about 3 blocks long. There is a pretty little park in the centre of town and a heap of chainsaw carvings all down the street (Logan has a photo next to one of the bear carvings). The amount of detail they can get with a chainsaw is quite impressive.
Anything off the main street was a little run down and dilapidated, some of the buildings have definitely seen better days. It did have a nice feeling about it though, we felt like we were at the start of the mountains with the little township surrounded on all sides. There were mountains peaking out at the end of every road, though they were small in comparison to what we would see later in the journey.
Day 31 we were headed to Kelowna. We weren't certain whether we would be able to go through Kelowna because of the wildfires, but they had just enough rain while we were in Vancouver to get some of the major ones in that area under control and even the smoke that had shrouded the region for the previous week had lifted dramatically. It was thinker as we got closer but didn't obscure the view fully like it had, but just added a bit of a mist to the air which almost gave us a better perspective of the depth of the mountains. Rach had suggested we go this way rather than the standard Kamloops as it was a more scenic drive. Our first stop on the road was not far from Hope, a place called Coquihalla Canyon, otherwise known as The Othello Tunnels. This is where some of Rambo was filmed. It is an old railway route of the Kettle Valley Railway that operated from 1916 and closed down in the early 60's. Because they tunneled through the canyon all of the bits not in the rock were subject to frequent rock slides, avalanches and falling trees. It was an extremely high maintenance track and that's what eventually led to it being closed. It was an impressive feat of engineering for the time it was built and the man who designed it was dropped in by rope from the top of the canyon to survey the area none else would touch. Apparently they used to schedule the journeys through there at night time so the passengers couldn't see the scary dropoffs! The canyon itself is beautiful. It is tight, unlike the vast size of the Grand Canyon, but it has beautiful blue water running through fed by the glaciers and the height of it from top to bottom must have been 100m. Just shear rock face with spruce popping out the top. The trail continues through the tunnels and into some quite different forest which is quite mystical. Little rock ledges with fallen trees covered in moss and lichen and the sun is obscured by the canopy of the forest. I believe Gorillas in the Mist was also filmed around here!
Once you get back on the highway you follow the rest of the Kettle Valley Railway, which no longer exists, but they have left all of the old station markers on the side of the road. They are also named after Shakespeare characters, apparently the engineer who designed it was quite a fan.
A little stop in Merritt for lunch was very reminiscent of Katikati. It's a similar size and there are murals everywhere. There is the Mural Walk of Fame which is a walk around 2 blocks with murals of famous Canadians covering all of the buildings - quite cute but also a little odd. The industry for the town is obviously forestry as there was a massive log yard as you first get in to town. 5 minutes out of Merritt is the worlds largest glass bell collection...so we had to go and have a look. It's a very quirky bell garden and it looks like it is part of someones property so we aren't actually sure who it belongs to.
We were keen to see some scenery so headed to Harmon Lake which is not far from Merritt. Unfortunately google maps doesn't seem to have a 'dont use unsealed  roads' setting like a GPS does. Pretty sure you aren't supposed to do on unsealed roads in rental cars but hey, 11 kms up a gravel road in Kane Valley we made it to the lake. It was quite pretty, your classic camping lake, and there are camping lots up the top that were all occupied by RVs. The whole area surrounding the lake and road was farmland (a couple of ranches) and there were horses and cows roaming fairly freely about. There were also signs along the side of the road indicating ski areas so it must be used for cross country skiing in winter, but it's not really a proper ski field that we could see.
We arrived in kelowna late afternoon so plenty of time for a wander through town in the daylight. Kelowna has a similar population to Tauranga City but the actual city is quite contained in one area. It's a little more like a combo of downtown Mount and Devonport in Auckland. When you first drive in from the top of the hill and over the bridge into the main city you have to remind yourself it is a lake rather than a harbor. There is just something about it that makes it not feel like a lake resort, but it definitely has the feel of a rich mans playground. There is a massive marina, beautiful waterfront, funky pubs and eateries and loads of tanned people wandering the streets and out on their jet skis. Any watersport is available and the hotels in the main city are super expensive. It was ramping up as we were there on the Friday night of the long weekend but it had a really nice vibe about it. It's so weird to think there are cities like this tucked away in the middle of the mountains! And we were thinking they would all be tiny little villages.
Day 32 was headed for Revelstoke. We had a couple of stops along the way and there were definitely showing the more quirky side of Canada. A lot of the things we found in this road trip were the types of things we were expecting on the American leg, not this leg! We found an Enchanted forest which was pretty cute but rather random. It's a little area in the forest with fiberglass fairytale characters and houses all through it, and little paths with miniature picket fences to guide the way. It was private property and back in the 50's the lady who lived there was a sculptor. She decided to create an enchanted forest in her garden being inspired by the surroundings and her husband dug out all of the paths by hand. In the early 60s they decided to open it to the public, and it is still as it was today.
Just down the road was Crazy Creek Suspension Bridge and falls....nothing too exciting and then on to lunch at a place called Salmon Arm (funny enough there was no Salmon on the menu). This was were we conected back up to the main Trans-Canada highway route. Because we hadn't had enough weird stops for the day our last stop was Log Cabin 1912. This was probably the quirkiest of them all. As the name suggests it is indeed a log cabin that was built in 1912. It was a gift/icecream store with a petting zoo. There was a bridge over the parking lot with mountain goats on it and massive dinosaur and bear models everywhere. There was a massive garden with old vintage cars in it, wildflowers and other animal models.
After a long day of adventuring we were quite late getting into Revelstoke. We managed to time it just right to get down to the riverfront park in time to watch the sun setting over the mountains. The smoke added another dimension to it which made it seem quite surreal. It's already an awe inspiring place ro be and the shear size of the mountains and beauty that surrounds you is hard to put into words. No words, photos, videos can so any justice whatsoever. It really is something you have to be in and experience first hand!
Revelstoke itself is very small and quaint. We can just imagine how gorgeous it would be covered in snow. It has a boutique ski field that keeps it going through the winter months, but in summer it does feel more like a place people just pass through.
Day 33 we were bound for Lake Louise. First stop was Revelstoke Dam. Not as large or impressive as the Hoover Dam but still pretty big, and surrounded by much prettier scenery. You can go in an up the dam but we had limited time with a full day ahead.
The road through Glaciers National Park between Revelstoke and Lake Louise was much more windey and loaded with snow sheds. There were are few in other places on the journey but they seemed to be every 500m in some parts of this road. There were a lot of avalanche valleys they were protecting from and obviously those roads are hard to get to with the snow plough in winter. The other giveaway with the state of the roads was a 40 ft truck down a ditch upside down and another that was fully burnt out sitting in the outside lane heading up the hill. It must have caught fire the day before or overnight as although there wasn't much left of it, the fire crew were still there and it was still smoking.
We stopped off at the Giant Cedars Boardwalk, and the cedars weren't as giant as we thought they would be. They are pretty old trees but they get nowhere near as big as the redwoods. They have National Park passes in Canada that allow you to stop and do trails etc. They dont really monitor it in most places and dont make it obvious where to get them or what you need them for. Once you have a day pass you can access any national park, the locals all have year passes, but we skipped our on the first one. When we asked the attendant whether we needed one she said not to worry this time. It is quite a good user pays system to raise funds for maintaining the parks.
Lunch was in a place called Golden at a little restaurant called The Island. It is on an island in the middle of the river.
Just before hitting Lake Louise we stopped off at Takakkaw Falls and Emerald Lake. This time we sorted out a National Park Pass which was valid till the end of the next day.
The drive to get to Takakkaw Falls is lovely, mountains popping up every turn (like most of the drive) with lovely winding roads and forest either side. You can see the waterfall well before you get to it and the sound of it as soon as you get out of the car is incredible. It's the second highest freefall waterfall in North America at around 250m freefall. The walk to get right under the falls is quite short but it is along the river and over a little bridge so it is really pretty, despite how crowded it is. As we have been getting higher it has been getting colder, and some of the mountains surrounding the falls have visible glaciers. It's quite a contracts to the hill the actual waterfall is in as it looks more like the grand canyon.
Right up by the falls we met our first chipmunk. They are so cute!! We weren't sure at first if it was a chipmunk as I had always believed they were smaller than squirrels but this was more the size of a hamster. On doing some research the Eastern Canadian Chipmunk can get up to 30cm long. It was pretty cheeky and not scared to come up and investigate us.
Emerald Lake was breathtaking. It was the first glacier fed lake we had seen and the colour it creates is phenomenal. There is a lodge on the side of the lake that doubles as a wedding venue and there was a wedding happening while we were there. They had the outside fire all stacked ready to go on the lakefront with chairs around it. It would be such a stunning location for a wedding. It was so tranquil and beautiful you could just stare at it all day and not get bored. It was so still nestled in the mountains, the water was like a mirror!
We finally got to Lake Louise around 7pm. Just in time for a quick wander around 'town'. Its called a village for a reason I guess. It is literally the hotels which each have a few reataurant/pubs and a small strip mall with about 4 or 5 shops.....that's it! I imagine it would be absolutely humming in the winter months and everything is a maximum of 2 blocks away. We rugged up asbitvwaa forecast ro be 1°c overnight, and we woke the next morning to a decent snowfall covering the mountain tops surrounding us. We were definitely not expecting that! It was a super cloudy morning with clouds hanging extremely low over the mountains, with just the odd hole showing showy peaks. It was quite surreal. We headed to Lake Louise as it was getting dark when we arrived the night before so we didn't make it. We walked around the outside of it which is about 2km to get a good view of Fairmont Chataeau. It is really quite something from the other end of the lake, and it was that beautiful aquamarine colour. The low clouds, glaciers and snow capped mountains just added to the beauty of it all. On the way back we spotted another Chipmunk hanging in the bushes munching away. This one was tiny, more the size we expected a chipmunk to be! I had been keen on hiring one of the red canoes and paddling over the lake, but at $105 (USD) for 30 minutes we passed.
Moraine Lake was also stunning. That beautiful colour again, and really expensive canoes lol.
We headed up the Lake Louise Gondola which is basically the ski lift but they turn it into a tourist thing over summer. You can choose a proper gondola cabin or an open air ski lift. We went with rye ski lift in the hope of finding bears below. It is meant to be the best place in the area to see them. Well I think they were all resting because none of them came to play for us. The scenery however was the most stunning I have ever seen! Heading up was a nice view of the ski fields (which Logan was getting very animated about) and the snow capped peaks above us. It got chillier towards the top but we were all rugged up in preparation. We stopped and had lunch at the restaurant at the top....a game platter. Most of the meat was raw, half of it was ok and the rest was gross. Bison tartar, roasted bone marrow, duck bacon (not like bacon at all!), prosciutto, cured bison and some preserves.
While we were 'enjoying' lunch our view was a panoramic of the mountains surrounding Lake Louise, and an aerial view of Lake Louise itself. There was a slight smokey mist which made it look more like a painting than a window! Then we got to enjoy the view all the way down. When we got to the bottom around an hour and a half later we noticed how much less snow there was up the top compared with when we went up. It was almost half gone, so the sun had some decent heat in it, and it was quite a thin layer.
It was just an easy 45 minute drive from Lake Louise to Banff so we left quite late and got there late afternoon. Something we had noticed previously on the roads, but there were heaps between Lake Louise and Banff, was animal crossings over the highway. It is essentially an over ridge that connects the forests on either side of the highway and is planted with trees and bushes and grass just like the natural forest. It is such a cool idea to minimise the disruption the highway creates for the animals in their natural habitat.
Straight away we were taken by the scenery surrounding Banff, and the little township itself is just gorgeous. It reminded us a little of Queenstown with similar buildings, lots of fudgeries and sweet shops, surrounded by mountains and  just generally pretty. We decided to head up the Banff Hotsprings for sunset. The pool itself is outside on the hillside overlooking the other mountains and unfortunately the sun sets behind the building site we didn't really see it.
Day 34 we kicked around Banff checking out the hoodoos on Mt Tunnel, and checking out Bow Falls which is beautiful! Quite different again to all of the other waterfalls we have seen. We were going to do the Banff Gondola after such an amazing view the day before but in arriving and discovering it was $64 each we gave it a miss. It was good timing though, as Logan spotted an Elk on the way back down in a tiny slither of trees on a tight U bend between the gondola and hotsprings.
We had a quick drive around the Vermillion Lakes in the hope of seeing beavers but it was the wrong time of day so we eaded to the Banff sign for a photo before makeing our way to Calgary. When we first pulled up to the sign there seemed to be a bank up of traffic pulled over just past it. We immediately pulled over to see what was happening as that normally means animals. The cars suddenly cleared and a ranger truck with its lights flashing came the other way. While we were at the sign the rNger jumped out with a massive gun (assuming it was a tranq gun) and crossed the road into the bushes beside us. We are not sure what was happening but when we drove further down the road after we had finished there was another ranger and ranger truck doing the same thing. We think maybe it was a brown bear as we couldn't think of another reason for them to be so uptight.
We drove through a few other areas hoping to see wildlife but nothing other than deer eventuated. There were some led signs in a subdivision telling people there were bears active in the area and to remove fruit from their yards.
We stopped off at Canmore Rail Bridge which was quite pretty, more of a photo stop and our last full of the gorgeous mountains before heading back into the city.
As you leave the mountains and enter the plains on the Cakgary side the view back towards the mountains is quite spectacular. There is miles and miles of flat plains and then an enormous mountain range that rises up out of nowhere and goes on forever. When you are fully immersed in it, it really does make you feel quite insignificant!
Calgary is a nice city. Quite stark and lacking character though. We went up the Calgary Tower before dark and settled in to the hotel.
Day 35 we just cruised. We had planned to go out to the Badlands at Dinoaaur Provincial Park and check out some dinosaur bones but 2.5 hours each way wasn't appealing after 4 days of driving
So we kicked around Calgary instead. We went to Lougheed House which is an old historic house that have fully restored, and checked out the river front (where we saw a snake which we think was an Eastern Garter Snake). They have created a man made wetlands by the stormwater outlets which is quite impressive. With a big travel day ahead we didn't do too much and just relaxed. It's a nice city but not really a destination unless you have something specific to do there.
We are in our way to Hawaii now for a week of recovery and celebrations with Logans family before heading home.

Photos: https://1drv.ms/f/s!AsbHvsl8mGaZgd8_k4c4J7WR9TH3fg

Fairbanks - Heart of Gold

Day 25 we disembarked the ship at 7.30am in Whittier. It is a tiny town on the coast with a permanent population of 40 people! It the summer it swells to 200 for tourist season. The town consists of a hotel, 2 shops and 1 apartment building that houses everyone that lives there! Even the Police and fire department are housed in the same building.
The only way you could access Whittierbin days gone by was boat or train, and they have now converted the rail tunnel into a one lane highway to make it suitable for cars and buses. It only opens every half hour to each side, so if you miss the tunnel opening you have to wait another hour for it to open again. At 2.5 miles long it is the longest tunnel in north America. Our bus from Whittier to Anchorage was a narrated tour so we had a great guide who filled us in on the facts about Whittier. We saw several Beluga whales on the way up that were super close to the shoreline so really easy to see from the bus! We also saw loads of bald eagles perched in the dead trees that lined the road on both sides.
As we got closer to Anchorage the highways were all fenced off from the trees and bushes that line the roads, apparently that is to try and keep moose from wandering onto the highway.
Anchorage was a lot bigger than we had expected with a population of 300k people! We only saw the bits we drove through on the way to the airport, but the airport was really nice with plenty of shops and eateries!
Once in Fairbanks the first port of call was picking up the rental car
We were staying quite a way out of town and with no public transport options a car was essential. We did a quick grocery shop and were surprised by how fancy the grocery store we went to was - a lot fancier than at home with beautiful organic sections and pick'n'mix deli treats!
It was a lot more expensive though, most items were around triple the price of everywhere else we have been as they have to ship everything in at quite a large cost! A bag of chips was around $6-$8!
Once we were stocked up we headed out to our little log cabin in the woods....which did not disappoint! It was only about 10-15 minutes drive from downtown so not too far out of the way and super cute! It was on dirt roads and with a heap of other log cabins with permanent residents living in them. They were all spaced apart quite well and each surrounded by Bush, and spruce trees. This made for lots of wildlife. Sitting on the rocking chairs on the front porch we could watch rabbits, birds and squirrels going about their business. The squirrels were really loud! They chirp like birds and drop the cones from the spruce trees on the ground once they have munched the seeds out of them.
I want too impressed by the toilet situation, I didn't want a dry cabin as it would have been a pain and having to go outside in the dark to go to the loo would have been hazardous to the health with goodness knows what animals hanging around - so our cabin had an inside loo......it was pretty much a permanent portaloo which Logan thought was hilarious.
Our main reason for heading to Fairbanks and staying in the cabin out of town was to see the Northern Lights. Contrary to the forecast which was for cloud and rain, we had beautiful clear blue skies and sunshine. I was hopeful this would mean we could see the lights as that is the biggest thing that needs to be right is the weather, then you need to be away from light pollution (hence the cabin out of town) and they need to be active. After a day of travelling we were quite tired, so we crashed out of the couch and set the alarm to wake us up at 11pm as sunset is not until 9.45pm at this time of the year.
When the alarm went off I checked out the windows and it still didn't look dark enough (it has to be properly dark to see them which is why you can see them in summer) so I snoozed the alarm for another hour. We finally got up at 12.30am and headed outside to our little clearing to try and spot the lights. We were expecting them to be weak as it was a full moon and the season officially starts on the 21st August so we we were pretty early on.
Once we wer out there it was probably less than a.minute before we saw them, beautiful green ribbons of light dancing across the sky. It is a little like a light show but natures own version, so beautiful and graceful. They really are quite a special phenomenon to witness. I tried to take some photos and onlyamged to capture one really fuzzy image....then I decided to leave it to the professionals and just enjoy the show. We watched them for around an hour dancing around in all different formations, and then they started to slow down. It really is quite difficult to describe what they look like, quite unlike anything else we have witnessed and we felt extremely privileged to have seen them. When we spoke to some people the next day they said they had been trying for several nights to see them but the weather had been no good, and that night was the first viewing of the season so we were extremely lucky!
Fay 26 wasn't looking so hot weather wise so we decided to head to the Chena Hot Springs and Aurora Ice Museum. It was around an hour and a half drive from Fairbanks along a road that supposedly has the best options for spotting Moose.....well they have proven very elusive and we have yet to see one!
I hadn't realise that Chena Hot Springs was a full resort. They have cabins, yurts and hotel rooms for a rent an a full Aurora Borealis viewing room so people can stay indoors and view them. There are also loads of hiking trailheads that start there so a lot of hikers base themselves at the resort (it is literally in the middle of nowhere). We started off with a tour of the Ice Museum which was quite cool (no ounce intended). They had some of the worlds best ice sculptors based there and everything is made out of ice
...the stairs, the seats, the bar, the glasses. They even have an igloo, and a few bedrooms that you can rent out and sleep in...all made from ice! They all have patterns carved inside them, or flowers frozen into them, or lights inside them so they can light everything up. The place is there year round and is inside a big warehouse that is kept at -6°c with ammonia gas. We got appletinis as part of our package that were served in ice martini glasses. It is quite similar to the Ice Bars around NZ but a lot bigger and more impressive, and you can stay in there a lot longer.
To warm up after that we went for a swim in the hot springs which was lovely. I could imagine how beautiful it would be in winter when all of the surroundings are covered in snow. The springs had a gravelly bottom which was unusual an a beautiful backdrop of hills covered in spruce trees.We didn't last too long as it was super hot water!
After that we headed to North Pole which is a tiny town about 20 minutes out of central Fairbanks. It is super cute...all of the streets are named after Christmas with Santa Claus Lane, Snowman Street, and of course St Nicholas Drive where Santas House is.
All of the street lights are shaped and painted like candy canes and the whole town is in on the theme...every bollard and fire hydrant in sight is also decorated like a candy cane. Santa's House is basically a massive year round Christmas store, but with beautiful stuff. I had to get a copy of one of my favorite books as a kid 'The Night Before Christmas' and got Santa to personally sign it for Isla. He even let me sit on his knee so I could prove he signed it for her 😊
Just across the paddock was the area he keeps his reindeer, and they are absolutely beautiful creatures!
We headed into downtown Fairbanks which was pretty underwhelming, and apparently nothing is open on a Sunday night. The riverfront has been done nicely but the Chrna River that runs through the middle of town is very reminiscent of Waikato River. It's the same dirty brown, just not as wide. All over town they have markers of where the river flooded to in 1967. It wolf gave been a pretty deveststi g flood! Because of the lack of anything being open in town we headed to a little Italian place not far from our cabin for dinner. It was probably the most bizarre Italian we have ever had!
Day 27 was pretty cruisy, mainly a travel day but managed to squeeze in a bit more moose hunting (to no effect) and a few other areas around town.
Pioneer Park was quite cute, just a randiw collection if old artifacts put into one park. They have an old Denali rail carriage, airplane museum, paddle steamer and collection of old log cabins that have been turned into a goldrush town. That part I a lot like our Historic Village where people run little businesses out of the cabins.
We also took a walk around Creamers Fields, and old dairy farm that is now a wildlife reserve. A lot of it is swampy forest and the Sandy Cranes and dunes is migrate there so through summer there are loads of birds! Apparently you can also spot foxes and moose there as well but I am beginning to think we deter them for a place that supposedly has do many of them they are bloody hard to find! Hopefully we have more luck spotting them in Canada!

Photos: https://1drv.ms/f/s!AsbHvsl8mGaZgd8-g_v41g2B4D-Czw

Alaskan Bush People (Pt 2)

Day 22 was in port at Skagway. I have to say this is the cutest little town! The main street is pretty much as it was back in the days it was a hub for the gold miners. It it one main street and a population of 1000 people. It doubles over summer with tourist season. The gold itself was a 600 mile journey over the Klondike Summot and into the Yukon but because of the harbour, Skagway made a good base for them to start their journey and collect supplies. All of the old buildings down Broadway had the original facades, but buildings built behind them that are more modern as originally they would have been tents set up behind the facades so it would look like a proper town but was just a shanty setup.
The first thing that struck us before we even got off the ship was the insignia painted on the cliff face of the port of a heap of different ships. This is a tradition started a long time ago, that the crew of a ship would paint this on the cliff face for their ship the first time it ever cisited that port. The height of it reflected the amount of respect the crew had for their Captain. Apparently there are some so low you can't see them during high tide.
They stil have the original White Pass & Yukon Railroad train that takes you to the Canadian border and the summit. It is quite a feature in town, but the tracks that used to run down the main street have been moved to run beside town now.
Our morning consisted of shopping and exploring and we headed on a journey to the Klondike Summit which is around 3200 feet above sea level. We stopped off at a little place off the side roof the Klondike Highway called Liarsville which is like a little shanty town where the media were based during the gold rush. As you van imagine the stories coming back from the Yukon were few and not very interesting as it was extremely hard to get to and to be allowed over the Canadian border you had to have 1 tonne of goods (which would take an average man 40 trips) so a lot gave up and never found any gold. Because of this the journalists did what any self respecting journalist would do and made stuff up. Consequently this fuelled the gold rush and brought in loads of prospectors as they made it out to be a pretty simple task to hop over a hill and grab some gold. Hence once people learned the truth they earned the name of Liarsville.
They have it set up like it would have been back in the day, and they let you do some gold panning. They collect dirt from the stream running through the camp and teach you how to pan. We got 2 decent little nuggets each....but certainly wont get rich quick doing it that way! This was one of Logan's must do activities as Klondike and Yukon are quite heavily featured on the Goldrush programmes he watches.
After Liarsville we headed to the Klondike Summit which takes you over the Canadian border. You travel through about a mile of no man's land as the border controls are around a mile apart and they shut them between 11pm and 7am! On the way up you go through Dead Horse Gulch which got its name because thousands of horses died there. The miners would head up to the summit and under such treacherous terrain and 100 mile per hour winds people and horses often fell. The miners so blinded by gold fever old remove all of their supplies from the horse and leave them there to starve to death while they carried on their journey. At the top we stopped in Tormented Valley, which is a little like  been desperate in looks but obviously pretty high up. They have a lot of filming done up there as it is such foreign looking terrain but quite quick to get to from Skagway. The trees all get shorter and shorter as you get higher because of the conditions and all they really grows is Locoweed that the Mountain Goats eat to get high and dandelions that are a favorite of the bears to get their digestive systems working when they come out of hibernation. Apart from that there is an abundance of Fireweed and not much else.
Interestingly they dont pay a goods tax or income tax in Alaska because of the abundance of oil it provides for the country. There are also a heap of unfinished houses around as if you declare your house as 'unfinished' you don't have to pay house tax. A lot of people build an attached shed to the house and never finish it for that purpose, claiming they are 'working on it'.
The ship had a musher come on board with some of his Alaskan Husky puppies for us to play with. As we didn't managed to do dog sledding we got in on this action! They were gorgeous..about 8-12 weeks old and their fur was beautiful! The one Logan and I got crashed out on the floor for the whole thing.
Day 23 was an early start for Glacier Bay. We had started to think we brought all of our warm.clothes for nothing as it had been warm enough in most of the ports for tshirts or just 2 layers. Once we got to Glacier Bay we needed every layer we had!! We spent about 3 hours out in the freezing cold winds on the bow of the ship to view the glaciers and wildlife. The early morning and freezing temperatures were totally worth it!! Before we saw any glaciers our entry to Glacier Bay was full of otters. We hadn't seen any to date so were stoked to see them diving and floating on their backs fairly close to the ship. We warmed up with a fairly small glacier as we entered the bay and then they just kept coming each one bigger and more vast than the last with hanging glaciers filling the gaps between the tidal glaciers. The last glacier, Marjorie, was 1 mile across and 200ft high which is the equivalent to a 25 story building! It probably also goes down 100ft below sea level as well! We managed to see it valve  couple of times which is quite impressive. You see the sheet of ice start to move, and after it has hit the water the sound hits you - it sounds like a low rumbling thunder. You get the odd rumble even when it isn't calving as the ice moves and pushes forward, they move forward 5ft per day!!
The boat rotated in front of the glacier for some time so we got around an hour to really appreciate it and take it all in.
Day 24 started with a sleep in! First one since the start of the cruise so we made the most of it. Today's adventure was College Fjord, where we would see 5 glaciers in the same spot. We spent some time on the deck after breakfast, just for a wander and spotted a pod of dolphins and  couple of otters. We had learnt by now to carry our binoculars with us every time we leave the cabin just in case!
Once we got into College Fjord the otters just kept on coming! They look so small from the ship but they are actually around 4ft. There were some lazing on an iceberg and loads swimming and lying on their backs. We had a lone harbour seal showing off that was leaping out of the water and flipping.
Once we got further in to the Fjord the glaciers were stunning! They all hit you at once with the biggest at the end - the Yale Glacier. This one is fed by 4 other glaciers and was the one that carved out the fjord when it was formed. It has obviously receded a lot but is still an impressive 1.5 miles wide and 300ft high. Again the glaciers were cracking as they moved and pushed forward and this one gave us some pretty impressive calving!
It is really hard to describe the majesty of the glaciers, the shear size and the beauty of them with the icebergs floating in the water, the beautiful reflections in the calm turquoise water and the blue glow coming off the glaciers on a cloudy day. So on that note our cruise has come to an end 😔 But on to the next adventure in Fairbanks! We are hoping for some nice weather and crossing our fingers we see the Northern Lights.....some late nights ahead!

Photos: https://1drv.ms/f/s!AsbHvsl8mGaZgd89SQEEHKwlC81HmQ
(I will post these photos when we get to Fairbanks tonight and have wifi again)

Alaskan Bush People (Pt 1)

After 2 travel days getting to the cruise we were well and truly ready to relax.
We decided the get the skytrain to the cruise terminal (2.50 each instead of $40) as Vancouver doesn't have Uber!
Our check-in day for the Cruise was mostly spent waiting as the entire national border control system for US Immigration went down and they couldn't process anyone. Although we were in Vancouver they do immigration before you leave port so you dont have to do it on the cruise when you arrive in Alaska. It was quite amusing that there was an older Englishman helping mange the crowds said the ship was sending a message to all of the Aussies that they had run out of beer 😉
The cruise out of Vancouver Harbor was nice and we sailed under the Lionsgate Bridge, quite picturesque so we are looking forward to heading back in a week or two.
Day 19 was a sea day so we made the most of relaxing. We went to a seminar by the Naturalist on the sea creatures of Alaska, what to look out for and how to spot them from the ship (this proved very useful later on). Later in the day we went to a presentation for Captain Jack Molan (off Deadliest Catch) about being a fisherman on the Bering Sea which was fascinating! Hes has turned into quite the animal photographer after capturing bald eagles that would always hang around his boat using a camera he got from an airport vending machine.
Most of the rest of the day was spent orienting ourselves with the ship, getting spruced up for formal night and enjoying some normal  familiar food! The big show on the first night was a full production show, which was only 30 minutes max. It was pretty food, the dancing is very slick with great choreo but some of the singing is not as hot as it should be.
Day 20 was spent in Ketchikan. Our first glimpse of it was from the top deck of the ship on the way to breakfast at 6am. It's quite a quaint little place, the waterfront is quite distinct with the colorful weatherboard buildings that line the boardwalk. The sky always has at least two or more floatplane buzzing around and there were 5 cruise ships in port so it was bustling while we were there. The population is 13k and they joke that they are outnumbered by the 15k bears.
Our floatplane tour started at 7am and we had to be off the ship by 6.45am so it was quite an early start. We got bussed out to Tarquan Air about 10 minutes through the other side of town. The omens for the day were set from the start with a random seal hanging around the pontoon as we were heading our to the planes. It followed us along the length of the walk swimming beside us and checking us out. It was a fairly bumpy take off from the water but once you are in the air is is like any other flight. The plane only fits 7 adults plus the pilot so they are pretty small. We headed out over the little harbour and towards the Misty Fjords where we spent most of the flight. The view was beautiful and wants from newer formed mountains that were quite pointy through to quite rounded mountains that have had many more years of glacier erosion. We landed in the middle of the fjords and jumped onto the floats of the plane to take it all in. In the winter months when there is no tourism the float planes are used to deliver goods to the more remote areas as there is no other way of getting there. It was an absolutely beautiful day with no clouds in the sky so we didn't get to witness the reason it is called 'Misty Fjords' but you can see the watermarks on the rocks where the waterfalls all spring up when it is raining. We had hoped to spot some wildlife from the air but we only managed to see mountain goats and sealions.
Because it was such an early tour we were back in town by 9am and already needing to strip off to tshirts because it was so warm! Ketchikan gets around 16 feet of rain a year so getting a day like that is unusual even in summer. We went for a wander to Creek Street where the salmon head upstream to spawn. We had learnt about the process during the naturalist seminar the previous day so we were schooled up on what to look out for. It's a pretty fascinating process and there are hundreds of them all jammed together heading up the stream. We even had a couple jumping for us. We managed to spot our first bald eagle hanging out on a tree above the creek, it was still slightly mottled so was just transitioning from teenager to adult we think.
We carried on up towards the salmon  hatchery where they keep and fees up the babies for over a year to help build the salmon population and took a little back road. It ran along the side of the creek and on the other side were houses so probably a private way. There were cars parked on both sides and bushes lining the side of the creek so it was pretty quiet. As we were heading up this little walkway/driveway we came up beside a big Ford van, and I was walking slightly ahead of Logan. As I approached the back of the van I was greeted by a young black bear!! I got the front half of it in my sights and my blood ran cold, then I immediately turned and very calmly started walking back towards Logan. All I could get to come out of my mouth was 'Bear' and signalled for him to walk the same was as me (afterwards he admitted he didn't believe me as I was too calm, he thought I was joking). At this point I had no idea if it was following or not, but we hadn't made eye contact so I could only hope it hadn't seen us. Next thing we heard a massive crashing nd shaking through the bushes beside the van and my heart nearly stopped, and as we looked through the bushes in front of us the bear was running across the creek away from us. Logan managed to catch a glimpse of it as it was running. It was the cutest thing ever, but it took a good half an hour for my heart to return to normal speed!! Some of the locals had come out of their house that backed on to the area and when we let them know there was a bear around there response was 'oh, I'm glad we didn't put the rubbish out yet'😂
After that experience we went and found a pub as we needed a drink! It all happened so fast it was quite surreal, and we weren't expecting a bear in the middle of town in the middle of the day. Safe to say we were on high alert for the rest of the day!
Sailaway was 2pm from Ketchikan so a short action packed port! But at 5.30pm we were heading through Snow Pass which is where the Humpback Whales and Dall's Porpoises hang out. We had been told in our seminar how to spot the spouts of Humpback Whales in the distance, but that we needed to be at the front of the ship as they normally dive deep when the ship approached as they dont like to be too close. We had also been educated on what bubble-netting is(a form.of group feeding....google it if you dont know as it is fascinating) and how to spot it but that we would be very lucky to actually witness it and lobtailing, which we would also be lucky to witness as the Male whales only do that when they have eaten enough to gain 6 feet of blubber and are ready to head down to Hawaii or Mexico to mate.
Our dog sledding excursion in Juneau had been cancelled at the beginning of the cruise due to the glacier being unstable so we were still deciding what to do in Juneau the following day. Apparently that is the best place to see whales bit we also wanted to see the glacier so we decided to see if we saw whales in Snows Pas and if not we would book a whale watching tour in Juneau. If not it would be kayaking on Mendenhall Lake to see the glacier.
The first lot of action was a pod of dolphins on Port side and we were Starboard, but we stayed put hoping patience would pay off.
We started off seeing one or two spouts in the distance and as we got closer there seemed to be more. The naturalist was narrating on the decks so you knew where to look and what you were seeing. As we approached the whales didn't dive and we realised they were actually bubble-netting. There would have been a group of around 7 whales involved and you could clearly see the process...spouts then breaching, then the dive down where we saw the flutes and all of them coming up with their mouths full of herring. We just followed the seagulls as they hang out above all of it as it happens to try and get the jumping herring trying to escape. They were so involved in their feeding that they carried on as we sailed past them so we got a great view!
Still on a high from seeing that a decent sized pod of Dall's Porpoises approached and some of them came right up to the ship to ride the wake directly under were we were perched. They just look like baby Orca, absolutely beautiful.
Then another lot of spouts off in the distance, and it turned out to be another group of Humpbacks bubble-netting. Probably about 6 in the second group, and again we sailed past and got a great view from our side of the ship. They would have only been 100m away if that, you didn't need binoculars that's for sure!
Our naturalist told us we were unlikely to se more because they are traditionally solitary and with 2 highly concentrated groups so close together there probably wouldn't be many more around.
We waited it out (only another 5 minutes) and there were more! Another couple of loan whales lobtailing! We were just on such a buzz seeing everything we had been told about and in such large numbers and so close to the ship is unheard of. Our naturalist said it is the best display she has ever seen....she's been doing it for many years and even she was buzzing. So kayaking on the lake it would be 😉
Our wind down for the evening was performance from Teacake (yep that's her real name) doing a tribute to Aretha Franklin and Whitney Houston. She was absolutely stunning but after such and emotionally charged day were were too tired to fully appreciate it!
Day 21 we arrived in Juneau, Alaskas capitol city. Well I dont really think you can call it a city by any stretch with a population of 32k. We spent the morning exploring town which is a litte reminiscntnof Dunedin with super steep streets and some of the streets are just pedestrian access as they are literally a massive set of steps from one street to another. We went into the Red Dog Saloon where all of the servers were dressed as saloon girls and the floor was covered in sawdust. We had tickets to the Mt Robert's Tramway but the queue was huge so we decided we would do that after our tour. We had booked the kayaking tour which headed off after lunchtime to Mendenhall Lake. It was a nice drive up to the lake, mainly bush, and the first thing you are hit by when you arrive is the glacier. The morning was a brilliant sunny day, but by the time we for to the lake it had clouded over. This is apparently the best weather to view glaciers as they appear bluer. We got into all of the wet weather gear they provided as there was apparently a storm coming in so it was going to rain (this unfortunately meant we didn't get any photos). Out on the lake we saw some Bald Eagles quite a distance away on the shoreline, the last Arctic Swallows of the season as they are migrating and Harbour Seals!
There were about 5 seals and at one point they formed a bit of a circle around us. One curious seal got within about 5m and keep hanging out with us, which our guide said was really unusual for them to get that close. E were enjoying the seals and were were told to head back in quite abruptly by our guide. Within a minute of us paddling towards shore a massive change in weather hit us! Failing winds working against us, torrential rain, waves breaking over the kayak and slapping us in the face, and ominous black clouds. It was a rough paddle back into shore and it felt like we weren't moving for most of it! Boy did that give us a workout! We didn't get as close to the glacier as we hoped but we got a few other things we hadn't bargained for.
When we got back and got into dry clothes we headed up the tram on Mt Robert's. Unfortunately the weather had really closed in and the top was shrouded by clouds so we couldn't see much, bit we didn't want to waste the tickets.
The show on the cruise was Motor City, so a smaller production show. Quite entertaining, and another exhausting day so we were pretty tired! We did learn as our new Cruise Director took over that New Zealand is the 5th most represented nation on the cruise..there are 38 of us!

Sorry about the lack of photos but wifi is scarce and internet is slow up here!

Nashville - Music City (Pt 2)

Day 15 was our day to visit Jack Daniels. Logan had been looking forward to this for a while. It was an early start as we had to be in town before 9am to get our tour bus. It started off with and hour and a half deive to a little town called Lynchburg. I dont know if it even really qualifies as a town.....it had a population of 675 people and the distillery employs around 600 people. The town centre is literally a square (1 block) and half of those shops are dedicated to selling Jack Daniels merchandise. We had prebooked our tour of the actual distillery so we did that ahead of looking around town. It tales around an hour and a half for the tour and it is very thorough! There are areas you are not allowed to photograph (mainly the parts of the process that make Jack specifically a 'Tennessee Whiskey'. The thing that sets it apart is the mellowing process where they filter the raw alcohol (moonshine) through Sugar Maple charcoal. This process apparently makes it easier to drink. They have not synthesized this process, it is still done manually at the distillery. They have huge fires onsite to burn sugar maple and make their own charcoal 3 days a week, and we happened to be there on one of those days. They mill their own sugar maple as well and trim it into lengths and stack it to weather in the yard for several months before burning (you can see these in the photos). The heat from the fire was incredible, we were probably 50m away and could stil feel the heat!
You can also see in the photos everything is a little bit black..including the trees. This is caused by the fumes that come from the whiskey making process!
Jack Daniel's actually purchased the distillery feom the preacher that taught him how to make whiskey at the age of 13. He left home when he was 6!
The barrel houses were pretty impressive. They are each 3 stories high and each level ages the whiskey in a different way because of the difference in temperature. They have 89 of these barrel houses on the property. They also make their own barrels, they use a brand new barrel every time as the theory is that new barrel gives the best flavour, and they sell the used barrels to other distilleries that reuse them. At the end of the tour you do a whiskey tasting session. They have converted an old barrel room into a tasting room so it is a very cool setting and you taste 5 of their top shelf whiskeys. One of them is the Sinatra whiskey which was created for Frank Sinatra and was all he used to drink (it's worth 150USD per bottle). That one was a round 90 proof, one of the others we tried was 129.9 proof.....pretty much rocket fuel!
After the distillery we headed into town for lunch and a spot of shopping. We ate at a quaint little cafe called the Bar-B-Que Caboose. It was an eclectic mixture of decor....kind of like a diner but the walls and ceilings were covered in all sorts of niknaks. No beers with lunch as Lynchburg (and the distillery) are in a dry county!
The 'Events Centre' was a little gazebo attached to a small marquee (probably 5x5).
We headed back to town and spent a few hours on Broadway listening to some more fantastic music and then made our way to the mall around the corner from where were were staying in the Hope's of being able to find some more 'normal' food. We settled on a German Bier Haus, and even that they had managed to Americanise, but it made a nice change from burgers and bbq 😒
Day 16 was our last day in Nashville and we spent a chunk of it sleeping...oops. after a few early mornings and late nights it was nice to feel refreshed! It meant we didn't get into town till 1.30pm so we skipped the sightseeing bus as we wouldn't have enough time to get around everything and instead opted for more music and a couple of othe bars we wanted to go to. It was also a rainy day so not the best for being out in the open anyway. We explored The Gulch which is a little boutique area with shops and bars...not really anything very exciting, so we walked back into town as the weather was settling.
Our first stop was Skulls Rainbow Room. This was on my list from the beginning as it is a speakeasy burlesque bar. It's down a little alley way behind Broadway called Printers Alley. When we initially went in we were struck by the authenticity of the bar and on getting chatting with the bar tender we found out it is a genuine speakeasy feom the 40s! Our bar tender gave us and the people next to us a fascinating history lesson on the bar and the area (something she has a clear passion for!). The bar was opened in 1948 during prohibition. Printers Alley was named for the fact that they ran the biggest bible printing factory and distribution centre in the midwest. All of the pipes running along the ceilings in the bar used to carry the ink for the printing. So during the day they printed bibles and at night it housed all of the speakeasies and ladies of the night. It was one of those places where politicians and mobsters would drink together. He was personal friends with many musicians through the years that drank in his club and performed on his stage including Etta James, Patsy Kline, Willy Nelson, Elvis Presley and many more. There is a network of underground tunnels under the alley running from Skulls to the Cumberland River that they used to get the booze in and out. Everything was done in cash so that there was no trace of what was going on. From habit David Schulman (the owner) continued to operate that way even after prohibition in Tennessee ended in 1968. Every night at the end of the night he would empty all of the cash from the cash register into his front pocket. In 1998 an ex-employee that knew his routine teamed up with someone else and planned to rob him (by this time he was in his 80s). They came in before a shift started and stabbed him taking off with his money. Because it was at the beginning of the night they only got $50 as all the money was in the register, but he died from the stab wounds. From shock the club was closed down immediately and was only reopened 3 years ago! They run everything in the same format including the live music and burlesque.
We also learned that the work Hooker also originated from Printers Alley. When the confederates came through and made time with the ladies of the night because they were away from their wives, one had a particular infinity with them...his last name was Hooker. Because he was such a regular the girls named themselves Hookers girls, and so the name stuck!
We mad enquiries into booking a table for the burlesque show but the only allow that for dinner reservations which were all booked out so we had to take our chances later on for a seat at the bar.
We called into Dicks Last Resort...Logan was dissappointed in their lack of interaction, but when we chatted to the bar tender she confirmed what we thought about them having to be careful because it is so conservative in the south! We moved on to Wildhorse Saloon to try and see some linedancing. This was the place to go, and they run free linedancing lessons every hour or so. We jumped up at lesson time and joined in to learn a basic dance with around 100 other people. They play a few well know line dancing songs which everyone knows the moves to and you just follow along. It was pretty fun! When the band comes on everyone just keeps linedancing,  someone will start off a routine and everyone else follows.
We checked out a few more rooftop bars and then headed back to try our luck with getting a cancellation for the burlesque show. We never managed to get seats but perched on a ledge right in front of the stage (be at view in the house!) to watch the band and show. The jazz band was fantastic (lots of videos in the link) and the burlesque show was great. It's an odd thing to have in such a conservative place but was full of mainly tourists.
We had an amazing time in Nashville, next time we would probably make sure we are there over a weekend as well....not that the day of the week or time of day has any impact on entertainment! It doesn't matter where you are, or whether it is breakfast or dinner there will be a live band playing! We are sad to be leaving Nashville as anyone who loves music would be, but looking forward to our Alaskan adventure and some slightly cooler weather!

Photos/Videos: https://1drv.ms/f/s!AsbHvsl8mGaZgd886vHnLVlc3wlwNA