Alaska - Day 3, Icy Strait Point

Gorgeous day - view coming into "port"

Lowering the tender boat

Let the real adventures begin!  Ok, well the first adventure of the day was part of the family missing at the 9am disembarking time from the ship for our Zipline Excursion...

It's a small port, and they don't have a dock for a big ship at Icy Strait Point, so they anchor out in the bay and let down the "tender" lifeboats, to ferry to the dock.  I'm not naming names of who was late, let's just say the conversation I had with my brother-in-law the day prior about how he will always be more concerned about getting places on time than his wife, was, well, more than a tad ironic!  Lol.  Good times.  Anyway, happy ending, we all made it on the same tender boat, and made our zipline group on time.

View of the zipline from my balcony as we came into the bay...

After signing away our lives, being weighed and wristbanded, we got on an old school, school bus (no pun intended), to take us on a tour of the tiny town and up the road to the top of the hill for our quick zipride down.  Bubba was super cute when we left her with my brother - so concerned for us!  Here's a picture of an add on the bus showing the height of the zipline.  My sister already pointed out that maybe I should have taken a picture of a different add that was more appropriate.  Yeah, yeah, whatever, this one was at the best angle to take a pic.

Just pretend it's apple juice :)

So excited to be on the bus!

That's better!

Beautiful views on our ride up!

Lake we passed on the drive

Our nature walk down from the bus to the zipline

And, the zipline ... drumroll please

So then we received lengthy safety instuctions and advice, yah, not-so-much.  "Put your feet up on the gate - lift them up like that when you get to the bottom..."  Well, anyway, that's all I got, brother-in-law I think got a few more instructions which would have been nice to know...  Those guys running the zipline were pretty much the most laid back dudes ever.

Getting ready!

Set ...

View looking down

GO!

I ended up turning sideways on the way down, and my sister went down backwards and was much faster than the rest of us, so she got pictures looking back at us.  Remember that additional instruction brother-in-law got, that the rest of us didn't?  Uh huh, something about how to steer - that would have been nice!  Lol, all I was thinking about was keeping my face forward so my sunglasses wouldn't fly off.  Totally forgot about lifting up my legs until the last possible second.  Lucky I still have my legs!  Up to 60 miles on hour on the way down was great, hitting the springs at the end, quite a shock!

But someone waiting and watching for us, was absolutely adorable, and soooo excited to see us make it to the bottom safely!

So then we played down by the water for a while.  And Bubba was very entertained by all her hideouts in the tall grass and collections of rocks and shells.  Simple pleasures.  :)

Bubba showing her treasures

Pictures on the beach

Panoramic portrait

Off we went to get lunch, and I had a phone message and got to call the fraud department for my credit card - I thought it was bogus, and that they just suspended my card because they didn't know I was traveling... Nope, somebody in Canada actually used my card number to make purchases at a gas station and a drugstore.  So completely random.  I had a feeling for a week or two earlier that they would call me about fraud, but now I'm glad I didn't call ahead to tell them I was going to Alaska and Canada, or they never would have flagged the charges!

Eagle & bro

Eagle in the tree

Oh yeah, lookee here at the Alaskan wildlife we found - bald eagle #1 sitting in a tree.

And there's my brother standing under the eagle sitting in the tree, panoramic vertical shot, I didn't piece it together, but the sun got in the lens so it wigged out the lighting a bit in the middle.

This was the first of many eagles we saw.  Pretty cool.  Much more exotic than the story my sister told me of  her watching some people get all excited and photo happy when they saw a seagull in Alaska, lol!!  Hope they came from somewhere landlocked - seagulls are quite common nuisances and nothing to celebrate here in California. :)

Waving goodbye to the whale watchers!

The afternoon brought adventures round 2.  Dad, Bubba, and my brother and sister all went on a whale watching adventure.

Brother-in-law was nice enough to go kayaking with me since that's what I really wanted to do.  He claims he did all the work and I sat in the back and didn't paddle - not true!
 

When in Alaska...

Awkward kayak skirt - keeps you dry!

If possible, I think there was even less instruction for the kayaking than there was for the zipline.  First they tried to put us in the wrong type of kayak for our "skirts", then asked if we were ready to go when no one had done anything to adjust the kayak yet.  Yah, don' cha know.  Anyway, we eventually got all set and pushed out into the ocean.

But it was more than a litte rough figuring out steering in the beginning - the kayak had a rudder, with foot pedals, and it took me quite a while to figure out how and if they were actually working.  We might have turned a few circles when we first got out in the ocean, and brother-in-law might have aptly remarked that this was going to be a "long kayak afternoon."  Once we got in calm water I got the hang of the controls, and did a pretty good job of steering from there on out - using a rudder is really weird when you are used to steering just by the paddle.  Especially when you are being dyslexic on which pedal to push, and you have to compensate for the paddle steering, and the over-compensating paddle steering by the dude in front who has lost all confidence in your steering capability in the first two minutes.  Haha, it wasn't all crazy, we actually did have lotsa fun!

Awesome weather & day for an ocean kayak adventure!

Look - he's not paddling!

Another eagle!

Closer view of sea plane

Sea plane above!

Gravestone Isand

An aside about Gravestone Island - a cemetery on an island, great idea, I thought!  So, I say to my brother-in-law that's a great idea, you can bury me there.  He says he's not going to marry me, he's already married to my sister... bury me dude, bury me, not marry me.  So then the conversation digresses to how he always thought an island would be a good idea during a zombie apocalyse, but this one, maybe not-so-much.  Lol, never a dull moment!

It was pretty tough paddling coming back in - the wind and the waves were intense.  And I do admit to not paddling a few times so I could grab my hat, which kept getting blown off my head by the wind!  Thankfully my ponytail held it on.  But I wasn't in any hurry, and neither of us were sore the next day from paddling, so it couldn't have been all that hard.  But we did go backwards pretty fast if we stopped paddling!  Bubba was super excited to see us come in!

All done!

 They got back from whale watching before us, we were delayed by the earlier kayak group getting back late.  And they saw lots and lots of whales, so many that Bubba couldn't be bothered to look at them anymore - she just wanted to read the books they had on the boat. :)

Coming up from the kayaks

Bubba reading books on the whale boat

Whales!

And the whale watchers saw a sea otter!

Totem poles!

Cute bear carved out of stump

Cuter bear!

Cute Bubba with another carved bear

Phote bomb creeper - burly mountain man!

Icy Strait Point Info

Spent the rest of the time before we had to get back on the boat enjoying the area, and following the traditions of the locals.

...and make a wish!

Cedar chip in fire tradition

Bubba helped us throw our cedar chips in the fire, following the local tradition to make a wish while doing so - only she had a bit of trouble actually getting the chip to burn in the fire.  Large fire ring, not-so-large flames.  At one point we thought she actually got one in the fire and her mom asked her what she wished for... without missing a beat Bubba said with a pout, "I wish I could throw better!"  Lol, kids say the awesomest things!

Bye bye Icy Straight Point - back to the boat.  This was actually my favorite stop.  Least amount of tourists - it's such a small port they only take ONE cruise ship at a time - great day!

We decided to try eating in one of the restaurants on the ship for once instead of just going to the buffet - bad idea when we were starving!  Longest wait ever!  And the kid menu mac & cheese with jalapeno in it was interesting...

I was a little bummed that I had missed out on the whales, but then I looked out the window and saw this weird calm semi-circle of calm in the water.  I said hey what's that, and my brother said, oh, you saw a whale - haha, yeah right.  And then this popped up!  Yay for whale watching from dinner on the cruise ship!

By the time we got to the dessert course, people started ordering a few extra options because of the small portions (ie being served one plate instead of all-you-can-eat buffet habit), either that, or someone has an overactive dessert tummy...

And now back to the towel animals I alluded to earlier... apparently brother-in-law had heard my creepy monkey story from our earlier cruise a few too many times, so he took matters into his own hands and made a request to his state room attendant... then he paid a visit to my room.

Putting monkey in my room

Monkey & my doggy

Creepy monkey greeting me!

And that concludes the commentary on adventures of day 3!  I'm sure we went to watch some cruise boat entertainment after dinner, but I don't remember specifically what that was.