It's Too Late to See The Goats (it's too late)
For the last year and a half, I was planning this fabulous cruise to Alaska for my own family of four plus my mother, step-dad, aunt, and grandmother. Having never cruised before, I enlisted the help of a wonderful travel agent who held my hand throughout the entire process and actually continued to answer the phone every time I called, in spite of my relentless questions about ship movements in the aft vs the bow vs the middle, starboard vs port side, how to sneak booze on the ship, how do our bags gets from the train station to the ship, how formal is formal night, really and my concerns about what side of the train we should sit on to get the best view.
Well. The trip is over. Which is EXACTLY why I never wanted the time to actually come in the first place. I loved those two weeks up to our departure and would live in those moments forever, if I could. Anticipation. The reason why I love going places moreso than actually going to them. I love looking forward to something. My poor friends had to put up with 1 1/2 years of me talking "Alaska this, Alaska that". I'm sure they are all REALLY happy that it's over and I'll shut up about it. Soon, however, they will realize.... that I'm planning an 18-day Arctic cruise for my 40th birthday in 2012. Yeah. That's right. FOUR YEARS of "Iceland this, Greenland that".
Hahahahaha! How horrible for you!!!
Sorry. The laughing out loud.... that was unnecessary. But still.... it does suck for you. 
Cruising was awesome. No doubt. I just loooooved it. I loved waking up with a different view every morning, but still having the same bed that I had rested my head on for all the days before. I liked being able to unpack that first day... and then not having to repack and unpack every time we changed location. I loved the cruise director's, with his British accent, intercom announcements that began with "Good morning/afternoon Princess Sapphire" and how every port day he said "welcome home". I loved the way I could feel the vibrations of the ship's engine beneath me (and we were on deck 11 so those are some pretty serious vibrations for the people on the lower decks. Hmmmm....anyway.....) I loved the joint where one could get thick weiner dogs, pizza slices, hamburgers. I loved just wandering around the upper decks and realizing I had no idea where in the hell I was. I knew I was still on the ship, at least. That was what made it alright. Had I been wandering around, let's say Rome, and gotten lost... that would NOT be okay. But getting lost on a ship... you know you're within 750 feet or so of where you should be. I loved the weather... it was between 45-60 degrees. Being the Floridian/Arizonian I am, it was a welcome change for sure. I won $100 at Bingo, judged a karaoke contest, dressed up for dinner every night, got my groove on the dance floor with a bunch of 9-11 year olds, saw whales, saw otters, heard glaciers cracking.
I also loved the midnight sun, as it is called. The sunset was around 11:15pm every night and it never really got totally dark. More like a twilight. The sun would rise around 4am. At first, this was completely weird and unnatural. We were roaming around Anchorage that first day and it was around 9:30 pm and you would have thought it was about 4:00 in the afternoon if you didn't stop to look at your watch. On the ship, we enjoyed drinks at the skybar and there was a glass, panoramic view. It was so neat at 10:00 at night to be able to look out and see whales and snow capped mountains. After a day or two of this, it became totally normal and upon our return home, I was irritated that the sun was setting at 7pm. I was also irritated by the fact that nobody was "turning down" my bed and leaving me chocolates and that I couldn't find the 24-hour buffet service in my kitchen, complete with clean-up. For those first few days of returning, one could often hear me mumbling "where the hell is Roger???" [our stateroom steward] Coming home was, overall, a bit of a disappointment. But I digress......
I wrote up this review for cruisecritic.com ~ it's not necessarily written with the Asherbelle crass humour that you all know, as it needed to be .... uh, like grown up and stuff. It might bore you to tears for that very reason and you will end up finding yourself sticking random objects in your ears for amusement (think John Cusack in Better Off Dead). The good news is, there is explanation of my entry title. If that's any help to get you through the review. It might not be. That quite possibly being the case, I have explained that bit in blue font... so you can just find it quickly and painlessly.
You're welcome.
THE TRAVEL THERE and ANCHORAGE
My family of four flew first class from Ft. Myers Florida to Anchorage on Thursday, June 5th. Having flown first class before, I knew what to expect from American Airlines but was excited to check out first class on Alaska Airlines from Chicago to Anchorage, as I had never flown that airline before. I was not disappointed. It was a 6 hour flight and it was very comfortable, the cabin was clean, the food, being mere airline food, was pretty good. Especially those delicous, warm chocolate chip cookies. Mmmmmm... delicious, warm chocolate chip cookies. We enjoyed our digi players [I watched The Savages, my husband watched Jumper and The Bucket List, the kids watched the Simpsons and FireHouse Dog]. The flight and service was great- very friendly and I loved the big, comfy seats and the way the cabin was layed out. The descent into Anchorage was one of the prettiest approaches I’ve ever seen.
Upon arrival to the baggage claim, we sat down, excited to finally be at our destination after a long day of traveling and delays in each of our stopover cities (from Ft. Myers delayed to Miami over an hour and a half, delayed to Chicago over an hour, delayed to Anchorage over an hour and a half). We watched the carousel go round and round and bags slowly being retrieved. We had five checked. Our bags never came. Not a one. We headed over to the Alaska Airlines baggage rep and filed a missing bag claim. The desk manager was surprised to learn that all five bags were missing. Actually… I felt better knowing that they were all together instead of just one or two not making it. This, I figured, meant that they were all in the same area and missed the connection somehow.
By the time we got to the hotel, it was about 2am. The shuttle driver really ticked us off, but that's another story and we got refunded for the cab fare we spent in lieu of the free shuttle service. We were exhausted, excited, spent. We checked into the Clarion Suites downtown Anchorage, brushed our teeth and slept in our underwear since none of our clothes made it.
The hotel offered a great breakfast, complete with "you make 'em" waffles, cereal, breads, eggs, orange juice and coffee. We met the rest of our party in the breakfast room for the first time since we all made it just hours earlier. We told them about our bags missing and a gentleman eating behind us overhead the conversation and informed me that there was the JC Pennys and Nordstrom’s right across the street. This made me feel better. My husband said “we’ll go to JC Pennys after breakfast” and I chimed in with “Okay, meet me at Nordstrom’s when you’re done.”
Right after breakfast, we had called the airline to inquire about our missing suitcases and were informed that nobody really knew where they were. I started to get quite upset and concerned by this point, having just spent my first morning on vacation washing my underwear in the sink and then blow drying them. I had maintained a calmness about the situation but slowly started to realize that nobody seemed to be able to give us a straight answer and could not promise us anything other than bringing our bags to us on our first port day. That would be Skagway. On Tuesday. Four days away. My heart started to palpitate. But there was not much any of us could do at that point.
After doing a little bit of “necessity shopping” (oh, and purchasing a fabulous new pair of Michael Kors heels to ease some of the upset), we headed to the Snow Goose café. What a wonderful view of the city, a beautiful day weather wise and tasty lunch food. Shortly after lunch, my cell phone rang with an Anchorage area code. My heart skipped a beat. Upon answering, I heard a nice voice on the other end telling me that our bags had arrived in Anchorage and asking me if I would like them delivered to the hotel or if we would rather pick them up. I told the lady that if I could kiss her I would, even though she might not like it. She laughed and said that she would probably love it. All five of our suitcases arrived 3 hours later at the hotel.We spent the rest of the day wandering about Anchorage… later fascinated by the fact that it was 9:00 at night and completely bright outside. As the “night” came…we rested our weary heads, excited for what was to come.
TO WHITTIER WE GO
The hotel shuttle took us to the Alaska Railroad station. We boarded the train with ease for our two hour journey to Whittier. Along the way, we saw bald eagles and snow capped mountains. We for sure weren't in Florida anymore. And that was FIIIINE with me. What a gorgeous two hour journey, it was! The train was comfortable and clean and the view was delightful. We drank bloody marys and took pictures and grew more and more excited with each passing moment. 
That moment of rounding the bend… and seeing the Princess Sapphire for the first time…. was a great one. It was THAT moment that I was most anticipated as I knew my heart would flutter with glee. And it did. I gawked at her… our beautiful ship… from my train window and exclaimed to the rest of my family “Look! There she is!” It was a glorious moment, indeed and I couldn’t believe that we were there.
It was a bit dreary in Whittier and we first had to meet Major Marine Tours for our glacier trip. At first, even though the glacier tour was very much pre-meditated and a highly anticipated event, I honestly just wanted to get on the ship to start exploring. But…. I walked past the Princess passenger entrance and into the line for Major Marine.
What a gorgeous adventure that was! The weather cleared up and we had beautiful blue skies. Now, being from Florida, personally I welcomed the cold weather. I don’t know about everyone else, but I relished in every moment of being chilly and having to head back inside the cabin to get warm. It’s not often that us Floridians (especially those of us in the south bit of the state) have to go “get warm”. 
The Major Marine tour was great. The crew was very friendly, the buffet was good, the scenery was grand. We saw lots of seals and otters and some **goats and a bear up in the hills. (**so my daughter comes up on the deck and says "Where are the goats". I respond with, "It's too late.". At that moment, my son created an entire song using the tune from One Republic's "Apologize" called "It's too late to see the goats". Hence, the title on this entry. The next time you hear that song, just substitute the chorus with his version and I promise you, you will never sing that song the same way again) Unfortunately, we did not get to experience any glacier calving. That is the one thing I was disappointed in, but that is to no fault of anyone. We enjoyed our peaceful four hour tour and never felt crowded or uncomfortable. As a matter of fact, in the main cabin, where they serve the food and drinks, only about half the tables were even used. When waiting in line with the other glacier tour companies, we noticed that those lines, one in particular, was much longer and there were many more people. I was very happy that it wasn’t an overly full tour.
BOARDING THE SAPPHIRE AND HOW TO GET A WELT ON YOUR HEAD 101
The joy and enthusiasm I felt as we walked through the long, tented walkway in indescribable. It was about 6:30pm on the day of embarkation and we were the only 8 people checking in so needless to say, it was cake. It practically took us longer to walk to the check in desks than it did to actually check in. Just before the gangway, they took our picture and we were on our way inside the ship. Everyone greeted us with smiles and directed us to where we needed to go. We were in our stateroom within about 7 minutes and our bags were there waiting.
All eight of us were on the Baja deck, port side, cabins B744 (inside stateroom for my mother and step-dad), B742 & B738 for the rest of us. Our room was a quad room, as we had our 12-year old son and 10-year old daughter with us. The two balcony rooms had an adjoining door inside the cabins, which was nice and, of course, our room steward unlocked our balcony divider.
Our room was clean and, while small of course, seemingly had a good use of space. The bathroom, albeit tiny, was actually surprisingly roomy, if that makes any sense. We right away unpacked our suitcases and stored them no problem under the beds. Roger was our room steward and he came into the room within minutes to introduce himself. We left the cabins to explore the ship and upon our return, the upper berths were down and chocolates were on our pillows.
This was the only trying part for me. Those upper berths. I am 5’11 and sometimes, I guess I forget my height. The first morning in the room, I was bending down to pick up my son’s clothes (never can seem to take a break from that, I guess) and upon rising, slammed my head into the bottom of one of the bunks. A sizeable welt actually formed on my head and I’m pretty sure that, for a few seconds immediately following impact of head to metal, I stopped breathing because I could feel myself wanting to scream in pain. From that point, my son didn’t leave his clothes on the floor. That was a rough start to that first morning, but after that, I was pretty good at maneuvering around those awkward beds.
WHAT WE DID ON THE FIRST FULL DAY
Hit head, as mentioned above.
Ate breakfast at the buffet.
Tried the “regular” coffee.Bought a coffee card (for me and my mom since everyone else seemed okay with that “other” stuff) and two soda cards for the kiddos.
Had a cappuccino.
Registered the kids at the Shockwaves camp.
Explored by myself.
Got lost.
Pretended to know where I was as if I had been on this ship 1000 times.
We were at the back of our deck and quickly discovered that we liked it back there. We were very close to the Laundromat on deck 11, the buffet on deck 14, the kid’s club on 15, and Skywalkers above. I also love the vibrations and the way she moves... it rocked me to sleep.
I found the ship to be very easy to get around. A couple of confusing parts, but nothing one can’t quickly recover from. The crew members were always smiling and greeting you and I never once felt like I was out of place or out of my element, even though I have a tendency to have a hard time in crowds of strangers, well with my social anxiety and all. With 2600 passengers on the ship, or whatever the number is, I never once felt like I was crowded. Well…. Maybe during peak buffet times, but one quickly learns what those times are and stays away if easily annoyed.
DINING - The Pacific Moon
We did the traditional dining, first seating. At first, I wondered whether this would really be good for us, but after our first night of heading to our restaurant, and seeing the hoards of people lined up for, I guess, the “anytime dining”, I quickly knew that I had made the right choice. I can understand why some like the flexibility of anytime dining, certainly, but for me…. and my control freak nature.... and being that I don’t adapt well to change nor do I like surprises ... knowing what time and where we’d would be every night seemed like heaven to me. PLUS…… we had Yayha. And we just LOOOOVED our Pacific Moon Dining Room server, Yayha.
Yayha is from Thailand and she’s gorgeous. Every night, from the get-go, she told me how beautiful I looked and how I should be a supermodel. Maybe she said that to everyone… I don’t know. And I don’t care. I loved hearing it and as far as I was concerned, Yayha was only for our table. By the first night, she knew what the kids wanted to drink, that I hated mushrooms, and that my husband would enjoy a sipper of Sambuca every night after dinner with his dessert.
Our party of eight, kids included, dressed up for formal nights (cocktail dresses and suits). I’m not going to lie. I was a little disappointed in the majority of the passengers with formal nights. While certainly there were many dressed in lovely cocktail attire and suits and even a handful of tuxes and pretty, sparkly long gowns…. A lot of the men I saw didn’t have on a tie and some, not even a jacket and I saw many women in something one might wear to Sunday service, not an elegant evening affair. I didn’t care for any reason other than the fact that I wanted to look at people dolled up because I think it’s fun. I did see a couple of people turned away on formal night for wearing jeans. Again, I was not offended by any of this, I just thought it would be fun to see an entire room full of fancy and instead, I got maybe a corner full. At least in our dining room.
I own my own cleaning business, so I don’t get to dress up during the day. I took pleasure in wearing a dress every night to dinner, except for the last night when all else had been packed so my Lucky jeans (along with my new favorite heels bought in Anchorage) were the choice for the evening. I had fun with my attire. And I saw others who seemed to enjoy dressing up, too… but for the most part, many remained pretty casual throughout the entire cruise. I enjoyed the fact that I was “not in the norm” so no complaints from me.
Now…. We do not call ourselves foodies, per se. But, we are also not inexperienced eaters who don’t know any better. The buffet was just that…. buffet. Some good stuff, some not so good stuff. But the joy of a buffet is you take what you want and leave the rest. However, we really loved our meals in the dining room. Every night, the menu changed and there was not one thing that I did not enjoy. Not wanting to be too gluttonous, I didn’t go crazy and order two main meals, for example, but…. when there were two soups I couldn’t decide between, Yayha would bring me both. She would also bring out something on the menu for the entire table to “sample”. The night a few of us ordered Alaska King Crab Legs, she brought out another plateful for others to enjoy, too.
SABATINI’S
Wow. The food. So. Much. Food. Definitely a fun experience and much of the fun came from the serving staff at the restaurant. I tried new things. They knew of my great distaste for mushrooms and specially prepared a couple of dishes for me. Treat yourself, if you can. You will be happy you did! Assuming you wear something with a slightly expandable waistline, I mean.
THE WEATHER
Again, being from Florida, I was ready for some cold. And cold I got! Depending on cloudy/rainy or not cloudy/rainy, it was either 50-58 and felt like 45-50 degrees or 55-60 and felt like 65 degrees. Either way…. Perfect to me. We were really lucky, I think, to have some great weather. It was a bit overcast for Glacier Bay (especially compared to College Fjord the day before) but it did clear up a little bit, at least, as the day progressed and still…. Cloudy or not….. Glacier Bay was awesome! I enjoyed much of it from my own balcony.
Ketchikan (our second to last day) was the only rainy day and even then…. It cleared up for a few hours in the early afternoon.
THE KIDS CLUB
Well, I'm not a kid so I wasn't hanging out with the other kids but I can tell you that my kids loved the activities! They made friends... did crafts.... actually learned stuff. They had a great time and every day, wanted to go be a part of the kid activities. As a parent, you can authorize WHO can pick up the children, of course, and also whether you allow your children to check themselves IN and/or OUT. And the directors of the activities don't mess around. We went up to Skywalkers for the family night disco and there just happened to be several sightings of whales from the other end of the bar. Even though I was up there at Skywalkers with them, unless I signed them out FIRST, they were not allowed to walk to the other side of the room to see the whales. I signed my son out for maybe 7 minutes and then signed him back in. Had I not been up there, they would not have let him out of their sight. Whales or no whales.
ON THE LAND AGAIN
Skagway--- cute little place. Nice locals. I enjoyed getting off the ship and wandering a bit off the main path. All shops along the main "drag"…just touristy stuff. Not really “stuff” I’m into. Did stroll into a little shop that had some cool carved things, including one of those little troll dolls (with the crazy hair) made of pure Ivory. Also, the fudge shop was fun. I was handed a “just made” baggie of cashew brittle, which was enjoyed later that day.
Juneau—four of us went ziplining here, with Alaska Zipline Adventures. Great time! Terrific zipline guides, cool day, fun, fun, fun. We had gone ziplining a couple of years ago in Cancun and really enjoyed it and this was quite different, being that we weren’t in bikinis, ziplining backwards into underground water caves. The tour lasted about 3 1/2 hours from the time we were picked up and dropped back off at the tram station. We enjoyed every moment!
Ketchikan—okay… I know it rains like 240 days out of the year here, but…. I’m pretty sure that, if not in this life, in my next life, I will live here. I loved it. It was rainy, but that’s okay. The little mists of rain and ominous clouds that lingered overhead for a bit didn’t stop me from seeing the charm that is Ketchikan. Maybe living in this seemingly simple town isn’t exactly your cup of tea, BUT…. I highly recommend seeing the lumberjack show if you don’t want to visit real estate offices during this stop. Very entertaining and fun for all ages! And the lumberjacks weren’t bad to ogle either *wink wink*
THE FRIENDS WE MADE
Not to be all aloof or anything.... but I wasn’t on this cruise to make friends. I was on this cruise to spend time with my own family and be enjoy seeing a part of the world that I’ve not yet seen and to experience my first cruise ever. What I didn’t’ expect was to “fall in love”. No no…. I’m already married. But honestly, I loved the Princess crew more than I had expected. I realize it is their *job* to be nice and entertain the bunch of us on this big vessel at sea, but I would say that either a) the niceness and humour of so many crew members we befriended was completely genuine OR b) they should all be in Hollywood acting and not working on a cruise ship.
Marion, the *guy* at Sabatini’s, who we called Martin the entire time only to realize on our last day that his name tag, in fact, read “Marion / Romania”. He never once corrected us. Anyway, he was awesome! So funny…. So witty…. So silly. My husband and I dined at Sabatini’s one night alone and while our anniversary isn’t until October, “Martin” insisted that it was now and gathered the Sabatini’s crew for a rendition of “Happy Anniversary”. We had a GINORMOUS pair of binoculars with us during our trip (a pair of Zhumell Astronomy binoculars) and he took them to all the tables where the people had little, dinky pairs of binoculars… got right up next to them as they looked through and squinted desperately to see anything and “Martin” looking through our pair, looked over at them after a moment to exclaim “Now THESE are binoculars!” He then proceeded to offer to sell them to the highest bidder. I think he had some takers!
Sascho - He was in the buffet area every morning and the first time I “met” him was when I reached for the pitcher of cream only to realize moments later, after only a tiny, forced drop fell into my Earl Grey tea, that I had picked the empty one. He seemed to feel my irritation of always picking the “wrong one” and we proceeded to have a little chuckle over how there are those of us who pick right, and those of us who pick wrong. He had a melancholy air about him and I just wanted to hug him every time I saw him. It was in the eyes. On the outside, he smiled and greeted everyone as he was supposed to…. But I could see it in the eyes that he was a little sad. Homesick, perhaps?? I gravitate toward those types of people. I liked to go out of my way to smile at them kinda like they so often go out of their way to smile at the rest of us; even if smiling isn’t their favorite. He did pull my husband aside to tell him I looked like Demi Moore, which I gladly accepted as a compliment.
I had a mani and a pedi the first full day on the ship. Sandy and Lizanne from South Africa took good care. We had lovely conversation…. A few laughs…. A few common interests…. Some similar taste in music…. And a few good stories to share. At the end of the cruise, I hunted down “my girls” to say my fare-thee-wells as I couldn’t get off the ship without a final chat. I exchanged emails with Lizanne, invited her to Florida anytime she wants to venture out my way, and she said the same should I ever visit South Africa.
DISEMBARKATION
After hitting my head one more time on the upper bunk, just for old time’s sake, I reluctantly went down to our waiting area in the Pacific Moon. It all went smoothly. It was very clear where we needed to be and at what time. It wasn’t overly crowded or hectic. At least not at our disembarkation time of 8:30’ish. Customs was a breeze. We found our bags with ease. Even got to say a final goodbye to "Martin", complete with a kiss kiss on each cheek and one final smile.
VANCOUVER
We stored our 17 bags (there were 8 of us, remember) at CDS Baggage. It was about $4.50-$5.50 per bag to store for the day. Certainly better than lugging it all around Vancouver, I would say! We only had a few hours to enjoy this beautiful city so we opted to go to Stanley Park, specifically the aquarium. How lucky are we that we got to see a baby beluga whale that had just been born 3 1/2 days earlier?! This was very cool, indeed. The aquarium is small but it was fun. The otters were entertaining to watch and there was a huge sea-lion swimming around that was very cool to look at. We took a taxi back to Canada Place to retrieve our 17 bags and headed over to the train station to catch the Amtrak to Seattle.
THE TRAIN! THE TRAIN!
For reasons unknown to me, I have always been a little freaked out by trains. They kinda scare the bajeesus out of me, actually. I really love to look at them… and observe them lumbering along the tracks…. But I’ve never ridden in one (outside of the Alaska Railroad earlier in the week to Whittier and a dinky little “trolley” like train while spending the summer in France years ago). This was probably my favorite four straight hours that were spent in one place. The people at the Vancouver station were very helpful and friendly and the train itself was comfy and clean. Lots of leg room and I loved the movement of the ride.
As I gazed out my big, train window…. I enjoyed watching the kids and their moms and dads line up to wave at us. Such a simple form of entertainment in this big world full of digital sounds and visual effects and it was really cool to know that there is still that unsophisticated enjoyment that comes from waving at passerbyers on a train. I waved back at them. It took me back a little bit. In a good way.
It was on the train that I had a chance to reflect about the week that had just passed. Approaching the ship in Whittier. Learning my way around the stateroom. The welt on my head that first day. The crew. The laughs. How one night at Skywalkers, we were the only bunch that had been drinking and were clearly having way too much fun for the rest of the people there (all 7 of them). Smiling at the fact that I won $100 playing Bingo for the first time ever. Curious about the next mix of passengers that would be replacing us. Wondering about, and unfortunately never knowing, whether someone would smile at Sascho every morning just to give him a little bit of happy.
As new passengers and faces come on board, the memories of us will quickly fade, I fear, in the minds of those crew members we grew to love over those 7 days. They, however, will remain in our hearts for a long time to come. Perhaps we will see some of them on our next cruise. Which I am already planning.
