What I Did On My Summer Vacation

I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaack. I spent ten days hiking, rafting, kayaking, and eating. That included seven days on a cruise ship. Here are some things you might want to know if you are thinking about going.

1. The Alaskan topography is breathtaking. Just flying into Anchorage is worth the plane ticket if it's clear and you have a window seat.
2. There is a really big mountain in Alaska called Mount McKinley that is called Denali. If you want to sound Alaskan, call it 'the mountain'. However, you will be lucky to see it at all because:
3. Alaska in the summer is cool, cloudy, and wet. No one knows what it is like in the winter, for no one other than vampires and their victims remain there past October. Winter in Alaska is not a noun but a verb: it means going somewhere else before the vampires arrive.
4. Princess Cruises has two lodges up there. Both of them are gorgeous.
5. Anchorage is a real town. Everything south of Anchorage is like a Disney fabrication illustrating what people used to do in Alaska. Every port of call that we called upon had the same seven stores. If you ask about newspapers, the locals look at you with blank stares. However, the scenery is always wonderful, even if all you can see is a hint of a pine covered ridge with a bald eagle soaring out of it. That, or a sea plane. Apparently everyone in Alaska is born with a pilot's license.
6. A cruise ship is a great example of reverse functionalism. We used to climb into ships to get somewhere. Now we go somewhere to have an excuse to climb into ships.
7. The Coral Princess was a hoot. Inside it looks like the setting of BioShock, without the flooding or the splicers. The food is very fine. It is served in reasonable portions and you can eat as much as you like. Meals are (for the most part) covered so you don't have to whip out your cruise card for an extra slice of cheese cake. You do have to pay for drinks, but they are reasonably priced. The more cognac I consumed, the more reasonable the price became.
8. I would like to tell you what the ocean is like, except that, like Waubay, you can't see it for the water. What you can see is whales and glaciers. Whales spend a lot of time trying to get out of the water, something that is called breaching. They seem to view the temporary experience of gravity as a treat. Glaciers spend their time trying to get back into the water. Our ship spent most of a day in front of one glacier and we got to see it 'calve'. Great chunks sheer off and fall into the soup, raising great waves that entertain the gulls and disturb the seals, who take their own cruises on chunks of ice.
9. Bald eagles are really big. The coast of Alaska is like the hair club for birds. If you go sea kayaking, you might get to see star fish but don't call them that because they aren't fish. They are sea stars. We also got to see jelly fish, which are called that but aren't fish either.
10. Ships rock. At first glance this seems like an advantage for women, who get to sit down when they pee. In fact it is an advantage for men as it excuses our characteristically bad aim. Taking a shower is easier than on land. You don't have to move your head to get all the shampoo off. The ship moves you.
11. Unfortunately, when the cruise ends they make you leave. 
    

I can offer four reasons for an Alaskan cruise: living on floating restaurant for several days, watching the landscape covered by pine, fog, and snow and the occasional glacier, and the wilderness shore excursions. All that added up to maybe the best vacation ever. Finally, there is a brew pub in Anchorage: the Snow Goose. They serve maybe the best IPA I have ever tasted.

Finally, we disembarked in Vancouver. It turns out I like Canada. It is positively crawling with Canadians, but they turned out to be really nice. They speak English, French, Chinese, and every other language. One final tip: if you go to visit Vancouver, check out the No. 9 restaurant in the Richmond suburb. While I treasured every meal aboard the Coral Princess, my favorite meal was the spicy chicken and cashews at this Chinese place. Nearly everyone there was either an Asian family or a European Canadian dad with his Asian wife and kids. That's a good sign.

ps.  While I was in Vancouver I thought to myself: this is the kind of place that would give out free pipes to crack addicts.  Actually, I didn't, but if I had I would have been right. 

Comments

[Stan Gibilisco]

"Winter in Alaska is not a noun but a verb: it means going somewhere else before the vampires arrive."

When I lived in Kona, Hawaii, I talked to a guy who spent his summers in Kona and his winters in Alaska.

I saw no fangs on his face.

[Ken Blanchard]

Maybe he concealed them well, Stan. At any rate, he was a very unusual dude. Almost everyone I talked to wintered somewhere other than Alaska. That was largely because Alaska is so dependent on tourism, which also winters elsewhere.