Fri July 11, 2025
Hi All! Today was a glorious sea day (other than the chilly, foggy weather!) and as those that have followed us know, we love our sea days. We like to get good sleep, get educated, be entertained and eat good food. What’s not to like?
So we slept in (at least one of us did!) and used the morning for education. They had three talks at 9, 10 and 11. At 9 they did port talks on our first two ports, Ketchikan and Haines. Since we’ve been to Alaska so many times (17??) and done most of the port excursions (and they’ve gotten so expensive!!) we decided in every port (except Juneau for whale watching) we’re renting a car and exploring the amazing scenery. So this talk helped us plot our course!
The second talk was my favorite. It was all about Bears! The speaker was Brian Keating and his talk was called “The Bear Minimum” (nice play on words!) and he talked about all the bears he’s seen in his travels. He said there are over 30,000 bears in this area (Yikes!) and they actually do DNA testing to determine the number. British Columbia has what’s called the Great Bear Rain Forest that’s the size of Ireland and has been set aside to help protect the bears and help the population grow.
They call the trees in that area “Salmon Trees” since the bears catch the salmon in the waters and take them on land to eat and leave the carcass there and they break down and fertilize the trees with the rich salmon nutrients. How cool is that?
He also talked about the rare existence of White Bears which are called spirit bears. There are only about 100 in existence and the indigenous people hold them in high regard. Hope we get to spot one!
The last speaker at 11 was Dr Rachel Cartwright who is the Naturalist on board this cruise and she discussed all the different areas we’ll go to and where the best sightings will be for whales, moose, eagles, seals and otters. She also has a table set up on the ship with maps and drawings and is there to answer questions. We stopped by to see her and she gave us some great tips for where to drive with our rental car to see all the wildlife. Can’t wait!
We then had lunch and afterwards listened to this really great classical guitarist named Tom Gamble. But then after that was the highlight of the day. A formal British Afternoon Tea in the Queens Room. They make it quite the spectacle by having all the waiters come out with their white gloves on and parade around the room. So cool! And yes I raised my pinky up high as I sipped my tea feeling like Queen Elizabeth, King Charles, William and Kate were all sitting next to me (but for some reason no Harry! Lol).
Whew, that was just thru 4 PM! We then got ready for dinner. I’ll do an update later tonight. TGIF to all!
The Wandering Italian 