Alaskan Cruise, continued

These pictures are some I borrowed from other cameras! I'm so glad I found some fun shots of us. This is on our first day, as we were exploring the ship.

These guys were being bozos with their binocs.

This is Ketchikan, I think. It was a cute little town all nestled up against the mountains.

Here we are cruising the Tracy Fjord, about to pass another cruise ship in the narrow channel. "A once in a lifetime opportunity" except for those who had done it before!

Here we are in Juneau. We hiked through the rain to find McDonald's to buy a $1 soda.

Thursday:

We stopped in Skagway, a historic gold mining town. It was pretty small, and fun to walk through. There was lots of historic stuff, which we actually didn't look at! We got a stamp for our National Park Passport from the park office, and then walked through town looking at the stores.

Friday:

Our second Formal night! This was our server, Mihaela. She loved Andrew and tried her hardest to keep him entertained and happy through our fabulous four course meals.

Saturday:

This was the nicest day of the cruise, weather wise. So we went some places I hadn't yet been, like the gym! And the top observation deck, and all along the promenade deck.

This was after we got back from the Butchart Gardens, Mike and Stacie went up top and took pictures of the open pool.

Here we are at the Butchart Gardens. It was an amazing garden--or really series of gardens.

This was a pretty little cove that we caught right before sunset, so it was gorgeous!

All in all, it was a fabulous week. We had a great time seeing the sights, enjoying the food, the company, and the entertainment provided to us onboard. My favorite part of the whole thing was the dinners every night. I really enjoyed ordering new things, and trying all the options that were available to me. It was fun to experience "fine dining" without the stress of having to choose something I would like so I didn't waste money. Our servers were top notch, and really professional. But it was also the most stressful part for me--it was one of the times that Andrew had to be well behaved, and if he wasn't, I had to leave. So I was constantly shoving food into his mouth trying to keep him quiet! We were seated at a table next to an old couple on their 60-something cruise! He was 96, and cruising Alaska! I enjoyed watching them, and wondering about their life together. Were they professional cruisers? Living on board for weeks at a time? How long had they been married? Any children? How many, how many grandchildren? At first, he was less than thrilled to have a baby seated near them--he turned off his hearing aid! But by the last night he came in looking for Andrew, and waving and talking to him.

Andrew won over everyone we saw. He was obviously the youngest cruiser on board, and everywhere we went people stopped to talk to him and comment on how beautiful he is! Every elevator ride was an adventure and we met so many people. He only had a few moments where he couldn't handle it anymore. One was during our seven hour wait at the airport! He screamed and screamed and screamed and wouldn't be calmed down at all. It was hard to stay patient, because I wanted to scream also--I felt like I'd been holding him for seven days straight and I was ready to put him down! He probably felt the same way, but the airport was not the place I could put him down to let him explore.

We were so glad to collect our children when we got back. They were glad to see us too! The few times we were able to talk to Isaac, he kept telling us, "You know, you're taking a long time to come pick me up!"