Things had settled down quite a bit this morning as we were approaching Ketchikan and the ship no longer rocked back and forth. We woke Rhys up and got him dressed. Mimi and Amina had already eaten breakfast. They had anticipated that this morning would be a problem for room service as our time in port was extremely short and most of us had early excursion times. We had originally planned on ordering early room service but then changed our minds when we found out about the possible wait this morning. They opened the Lido Restaurant breakfast buffet early at 5:30 am to accommodate those with early excursions.
After breakfast, we made our way back to the Queen’s Lounge and received our tour stickers. We were anchored again at this port and would be tendering to town. After a short wait, we headed down to Deck A to board the tender. It was raining and our highs today would be in the 50’s. We then boarded a nice bus and were taken to the Saxman Village which was just a short drive from the port. The tour guide explained how groceries were imported via air or sea. Some women in town had formed a Costco shopping group who put their orders in twice a month and had their items shipped out of Seattle.
Our first stop was to watch a short film about the village.
We then took a short nature trail and walked to one of the largest long houses in Alaska – it was the house of the Beaver clan.
We watched a performance by the Saxman Natives representing many of the different clans: Raven, Eagle, Beaver, Phoenix, etc. They sang some traditional songs, danced, and explained some of their traditions including holding potlatches. At the end, they invited some audience members to put on their traditional regalia and participate in a dance with them.
We headed outside and our tour bus driver explained each of the totems located in front of the house.
We then walked a short distance to the Edwin C Dewitt Carving Center where 2 totem pole carvers were working on their totems. They answered questions and showed us some of the tools that the carvers used.
We then were allowed to shop in the gift shop but were warned at how slow the cash registers were and they weren’t exaggerating. We bought a Saxman village magnet, 2 beautfiful carved candle stick holders, and a set of Alaska placemats. The single cash register was overwhelmed with people trying to make their purchases.
We reboarded the bus and were taken back to town and dropped off near the Lumberjack show. We had a brief scare when we realized that Rhys had left his backpack on the bus but some nice passengers had taken his backpack and returned it to us. We found seats at the show under the shelter which had radiant warmers above which helped take the edge off the chilly weather. We were soon introduced to the 2 “teams” of lumberjacks making up the Spruce Mill team and the Dawson Creek team. Each team consisted of one larger lumberjack and one shorter/smaller lumberjack. They progressed through each of the contests and when one side “won”, a wood chip would be given to the audience. The lumberjacks, chopped, dragged stumps, used chain saws, climbed poles, and had a log rolling contest as we cheered for the Spruce Mill team.
The kids loved cheering on our team and boo-ing the other team. Our team won most of the contests.
After the show, it was almost 11:30 and the last tender back to the ship was at noon. We stopped to use the bathroom and then walked back the 3 or 4 blocks to the ship. One criticism I have about this tour is that there was no transportation provided back to the tender area. If we had had elderly members of our party travelling with us to see the show, I would not have been happy with the walk in the rain back to the pier. When we arrived at the pier, the line was very long and we joined it waiting about 20 minutes to get on a tender. We left the pier at about noon and the line was still quite long to get back to the ship.
We stopped by our cabins to drop things off and then made our way to the dining room for lunch. I had the Alaskan fritters and the hamburger with chipotle sauce.
We had scheduled the premium wine tasting for this afternoon. We sent the kids back to the cabin with Mimi to take a rest and Seth, Papa, and I went to the wine tasting which was considerably smaller than the first one.
There was just one table with about 10 people at this tasting. We tasted 6 items today – a champagne, 2 white, 2 red, and a brown muscat. I liked all of them but don’t really care for the champagne. My favorite was the brown Muscat paired with a small crème brulee. The Rioja red was also excellent paired with a chocolate truffle. I was incredibly tired during the wine tasting and couldn’t wait to get back to the cabin to take a nap. I ran the kids over to the Club at 3 pm and napped until about 5 pm and felt much better.
Tonight was our last Formal night and thankfully the seas were much calmer than the night before.
We got dressed and stopped by to have our portraits taken. I had the Escargot as an appetizer, then the cherry soup which was very good.
For the entrée, I had the Chef’s recommended Osso Buco which was very good but I was absolutely stuffed. They also offered the traditional lobster tail this evening and after the entrees were cleared, they paraded the traditional Baked Alaska around the dining room. We were each served a slice of Baked Alaska for dessert.
I snapped a picture of Krish and Agus after dinner and tipped Krish an extra $20 for his excellent service. I also commented to the head Steward complementing Krish on what a great job he did. Seth and I have been on more than half a dozen cruises and Krish is definitely one of our favorites for being so friendly and efficient.
We stopped by the photo shop and found our pictures – some were quite good but we wanted to wait until our pictures from tonight were processed before purchasing any.
We went to the show this evening entitled “On the Air” which was a song and dance revue through the decades. The performers were quite good but Rhys was extremely tired and quickly fell asleep during the show.
We headed back to the cabin and called it a night. A towel rhino was sitting on Rhys' bed.
I don’t even remember my head hitting the pillow I was so tired.
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