Our mother/son Alaskan cruise experiences refuse to be corralled into a linear account. They are bubbling and collaging together into something more spiritual, abstract, and dreamlike. The thought of leaving so much untold bothers me, though, because my memory is so shoddy without a point by point blog entry to refer back to later. So...I don't know quite where to go.
You can start here on our Flickr site where I have 170 photos from our trip.
Here, from September 2006, is an entry where I talk about the same cruise itinerary that I took with Daniel in our more adventurous, childless days.I was glad that I'd been on that same cruise before so I didn't feel as distraught when toddler-needs prevented me from doing certain things. Because of Graeme's sleep schedule and interests, we didn't attend any of the shows, restaurant seatings, or other cruising entertainments. There was no fancy meals, no live music, no late nights. The first night onboard set the tone when he conked out in the room for the night by 5:30pm, just an hour after we'd set sail! Luckily, the room was perfectly suited for long hours spent in it. It was comfy and spacious and had a private balcony to deliver the sights for me even when Graeme wasn't interested. When I wasn't taking photos or using my binoculars to scan the seas for whales, I was able to relax and read books or watch videos on my laptop. I had so much time to read, in fact, that I was over-the-moon excited to find books for 75 cents at a Salvation Army in one of the ports to restock my supply. There was a strange quasi-historical fiction bend to all of them, part interests, part sheer coincidence, that contrasted sharply with my ultra-modern surroundings.
Cruising Booklist
The White Queen by Phillipa Gregory
The Other Queen by Phillipa Gregory
The Raging Quiet by Sherryl Jordan
Elizabeth I: Red Rose of the House of Tudor, England, 1544 by Kathryn Lasky
The Goose Girl by Shannon HaleThe ship transported us where we wanted to go and became a comforting homebase for our adventures. The Market Cafe's anytime buffet suited our changing schedule and provided an endless supply of bread rolls, chick peas, sliced fruits, steamed veggies, and unremarkable curries. Room service delivered covered dishes and the makings for hot tea while I sat out on the balcony with my books and binoculars. In port, we sought out local coffee shops for quick meals and kept Luna/Lara/Odwalla bars in my pack for instant snacks. None of it was gourmet, or even good, but it was toddler-friendly, convenient, and totally acceptable.
Within a day, Graeme had learned his way around the ship. It was astounding, really, that he could find our cabin when there were hundreds and hundreds of identical doorways on floor after floor. He navigated the elevators (counting the floors as they showed up on the display) and the decks with ease. Quickly, his interests narrowed to a few key places: the video arcade (where a handful of driving simulators caught and held his attention), the Under 2 Zoo (where children his age could play with their parents--essentially an unused lounge room with an awesome view and some uninspiring toys to play with), the Photo Gallery (where we played the "can you find the picture of Mama?" game), the Promenade Deck (where we could run around the entire ship's deck), the Library (where children's books could be read), the Buffet (where every staff member knew and welcomed him), the Gift Shop (where a steep entrance ramp provided much running and jumping fun), and finally Home (the cabin, where
Blue's Clues,
Sesame Street, and
Yo Gabba Gabba! are available 24/7 on Mama's laptop).
( Behind here, for the morbidly curious like me, an actual account of how much everything cost. Because really, that's a big secret in the cruising world and I'm gauche enough to tell you. )What we paid for wasn't the cruise ship amenities, but the opportunity to see the otherworldly beauty of Southeast Alaska and to live on the sea, sunrise to sunset, moonrise to moonset, for seven glorious days. There are colors in Alaska that no camera can capture adequately--the teal turquoise brilliance of glacier-silted waters, the blue-black of stark fjord cliffs, the impossible blue at the heart of icebergs glittering in the sun. There are sounds that spoke directly to my soul--the huffing breath of a giant humpback whale, the cry of hundreds of seagulls cycloning over a bait ball, the eerily comforting sounds of a ship curving itself over waves, the creak of the metal fittings and paneled ceilings, the whine of the wind through the gaps in a door, the bone-finger tapping of wooden hangars against the inside of the wardrobe. We lived in a world of waves and mist, more often than not alone, experiencing a place where nature still is obviously in control, the landscape touched only occasionally by human intervention. We were in this giant metal ship, a trophy of human ingenuity, and yet that Sea Lady in her gray satin gown could have squished us like a pea at any point. How thrilling and appropriate, small and vulnerable, part of the cycle as we ought to be. One magnet I got from a local artist reads, "Life is Good. Death is not Bad." Somehow, living that plugged in did make the other side of the bargain of life seem accessible and good in some way I can't explain. The exquisite beauty of an embodied life as a transitory experience.
The animals! Oh, the animals! We had pods of dolphins crossing our bow, escorting us along at speeds of something like 18 knots. My photos never captured our companions more than just a grainy Big-Foot-esque bit of footage. They weren't there for the photography. When I looked with my eyes I saw incredible things and when I fumbled and fiddled with my camera, missed almost all. You must trust me then, that the dark sinuous form of humpback whales curving from air to water was breathtaking. Everyone on board had their own whale stories--chance sightings as we barreled along. A spout out the window at breakfast, a tail waving as they towel-dried their hair in the room, the sound of their breath in the dark at night. Private, personal visits to us--nothing showy, nobody stampeding to the rail to see them. Three sea gulls, flying low to our wake, kept me company for what seemed to be the entire cruise--always just off our starboard side, straight out from my balcony windows.
The shore excursions were such lovely opportunities to see more. In Skagway, we took an old narrow-gauge railroad forty miles up the pass to Canada, following the route of desperate goldseekers. In Prince Rupert, a First Nations boat took us out to see more whales in some remote and exquisite bays and shorelines. In Juneau, what I'd intended to enjoy as a hokey 'pan for gold' excursion turned out to be the chance to pick up gorgeous rocks along a wild and scenic creek bed and to pan its finger-numbingly cold sands for gold flakes--successfully.
Our trip was beautifully bookended by days in Seattle visiting Daniel's sister, Deborah, and our soon-to-be-a-teenager niece, Sequoia. Happy long summer days together--picking wild blackberries for cobbler, visiting the farmer's market, padding barefoot through their new home, laughing at the park as Graeme swings and says, "Weeeeee!".
( Select photos from our days on the sea. )![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
