Monogram Mondays Postponed

Sorry...

Sweet Gabby girl is home from school today, a little under the weather and I don't have time to upload pics. I will try to do it tomorrow!

She doesn't have a fever but she was up all last night coughing and was so tired this morning that I didn't have the heart to wake her. She ended up sleeping until 10:15!!

She has been in a great mood today! I was reading a friends blog the other day and she talked all about how she sings "you are my sunshine" to her kiddos before bed... I love this idea! So I finally instituted it last night and the girlies loved it.

Today Gabby sang me her rendition:

Sunshine turns into rainbooowwwws,
rainbows make the moon go awaaaay.
I don't care if you don't love me
I will love you stiiiill.
The moon circles around and around
and the Sun can makes the moon go dooowwwn.
and I love you so muuuch.

haha! I don't think writing it does it justice! :)

Sitka and The Hubbard Glacier Cruise

Next we arrived in Sitka. It was the home to one of our favorite adventures (and we had many amazing side trips). We suited up in full 'astronaut' suits... complete with windstopper hoods! and we boarded a six person raft. Each person then straddled a horse type apparatus and held on for dear life as we sped, at high speeds, over the open ocean seeing whales, sea otters, ocean caves, islands with deer and bear. Did I mention we went really fast? It was awesome!!!

Here we are suiting up! We had no idea what this was all about and when we saw the suits we got a little nervous!!

Here we are with the hoods up... after we started we adjusted them so you could only see our eyes!

Mary got a little friendly with the sitka bear!

That night we had a lot of fun with all of Mary's fellow Circle of Excellence people... we danced and sang the night away despite the crews continuous warnings that we should go to bed because the next morning was the cruise at Hubbard Glacier bright and early (6:30am). We blew them off and figured we would be fine! Ha... well... we were VERY glad we drug ourselves out of bed on 3-4 hours of sleep to see this...!!

It was incredible and, again, (like most things in Alaska) pictures don't do it justice.

The crew said it was a very active day on the glacier... we got to see it calve a few times. Most visits they don't get to see it do it all. It was thunderously loud and magnificent. The water was gray from all the glacier silt. I just can't put into words how intense this massive structure is.

We ordered breakfast to our room so we could enjoy coffee and hot chocolate on the balcony and just watch this amazing thing!!!

What a great way to wrap up our Alaskan Adventure. We had such a great time in this amazing state and as is always the case... it was good to go and good to get back!

Skagway

What a spooky little town Skagway was... literally! It felt like an abandoned Disney World. It was a very popular Goldrush town back in the goldrush days and now it is basically just a cute town set up for tourists. There was this cute train right outside our boat and I had to love this trains name!


When we arrived we hopped on a van to the ziplines! It was amazing zipping through the alaskan mountains and forests! The views were incredible as was the rush of the zipline.

After our zipline fun we went on a quick ghost and goodtime girls tour. It was great... mostly due to our great guide. She did a great job playing the part of a 'goodtime girl' (aka Hooker). She was full of one liners and we were laughing the entire time!

She took us through the town and pointed out all the interesting, historical places and stories. She was very knowledgeable about the facts of the gold rush goodtime girls and went into the good and bad of the 'profession.' She also told us all the ghost stories of this crazy little town. There were some crazy people in this place!


After a fun day in Skagway, it was nice to relax on the balcony as we set sail... stay tuned for Sitka and the Hubbard Glacier!

Juneau

The next morning we awoke to the beautiful Tracy's Passage. It was amazing! I still can't believe how blue the water was and the shoreline was littered with waterfalls... some pretty great litter if you ask me! :) We cruised in this section until around 1:00 when we arrived in Juneau.


AMAZING! How does the cruise boat fit in this passage?... VERY SLOWLY!



It was stunning!

In Juneau we geared up to go Kayaking at the face of the Mendenhall Glacier. We were in a two person kayak in the ocean!! We really wanted to see whales however we 'settled' for a ton of eagles and sea otters. (plus, we saw whales later and were REALLY glad we didn't see any of these majestic animals in our little kayak... it would have been WAY to close for comfort!!)

Such flattering dry suits! :)

oh and you thought it couldn't get more flattering! :) That is the glacier in back of us. Pretty cool! While kayaking with our little group, Mary and I had a little challenge for each other.. we tried to see who could keep their hand in the water longest... we ended in a truce/tie because our hands went numb after a few minutes and we could have left them in the water for hours! :)




There were so many eagles and they were magnificently HUGE! this was a little beach party that we were able to get right up on before they flew away.



In Juneau, we had the most amazing crab from this little shack on the water. It was incredible! The crab bisque and poorboy were so good!!




Here is the lady in action... I have never seen a crab leg that big!!!

That evening we were able to make it on an evening whale watching quest. It was so cool! These pictures just don't do it justice. Our whale spotter was named Tally Teal and she had a zest for whales... and that is putting it mildly!! She was jumping up and down in excitement. They were cool after all... We saw humpback whales and orca whales (which they only see 10% of the time) and they were breathtaking!


Here is the mommy and baby orca.

and here is the daddy orca

The huge (male) killer whale jumped out of the water twice. We are talking seaworld style! and I missed it the first time. You might ask why did I miss the whale on the whale watching cruise? Oh... I was just taking a picture of the Alaskan beer... It was a cute label! Of course! Don't worry I did see it the second time and it was great!

We also had the chance to stop by this 'cute' (not polka dots and pink/green cute but like guns, filth, liquor, cadavers, and rustic cute) saloon. I kind of equate this to the Marthas Vineyard black dog logo. This was quintessential Alaska at its best!

Cheers Alaskans!!

Ketchikan

So, our first stop along the way was Ketchikan, Alaska. It was such a cute little fishing town! We started our stay with a horse drawn trolley ride around the town center. We learned a lot about the town and enjoyed all the cheesy jokes! Here were some of the highlights of the trolley ride...


This was the old red-light district. All these darling little houses have a back alley up to them called the Married Mans Trail so that the married men who wanted to visit could use the back doors. The only problem was the back trail wasn't paved and the men were always a little (or alot) muddy! Ha! Try explaining that one to the wife! :)
We also thought this next sign was hilarious and classic Alaska! Who knew mexicans made great pizza!

We saw this all over Alaska...a salmon ladder. I guess it helps the salmon travel up stream... we didn't ever see them in action.


After exploring the town a bit more we hopped on a 30 minute bus ride to this beautiful temperate rain forest. It was incredible! We canoed over to this island and went hiking and then had chowder and hot chocolate. What a trip!



Yes... Mary is the only person in the ENTIRE state of Alaska we saw wearing shorts and EVERYONE looked and/or said something to her... she was so proud of her toughness! :) HA! Her classic line was... "it is in the 100's in Chicago and I don't care how cold it is here, I am going to enjoy it!" Yes... let's just say this was the only day she wore shorts!

Canoeing on the Lake


hiking in the rain forest

the chowder was great as was our trip in Ketchikan! It was definitely one of our favorite Alaskan cities... stay tuned for Juneau

Setting sail and our first day at sea...

We were greeted by a bottle of bubbly and a fabulous room with a sitting area and a balcony... seriously Johnson and Johnson spared no expense treating my great sister! We, of course, broke into the champagne before we realized we had the (mandatory) lifeboat drill... we made it a bit extra fun! :)

don't worry everyone the boat didn't sink... I have been back a month... and it is a good thing because we goofed off the entire time! Mary even set off her emergency whistle!! HILARIOUS! Jonathan, who trained at Julliard, had to come over and turn it off (one of the dancers side jobs is doing the emergency drill). Oh, Jonathan, we so appreciated you! HAHA!



Then, that evening, we had the set sail party on the main deck. I sported one of my MANY, cute cruise-like dresses... and it was the LAST night (or day) that it was anywhere warm enough for a dress... can we say I packed ALLLLL wrong! I have never been tempted to buy $320 Ugg boots (yes they were that marked up) in my life... (don't worry Derek I didn't!)

The next morning we awoke to this...

AMAZING! Beautiful!! We had breakfast in our room and enjoyed the beautiful view. It was so great just to relax and read books and enjoy the breathtaking views as we floated. Relaxing, fabulous, and yummy right up to the point when I got motion sick... yep... I enjoyed that yummy breakfast twice! HA!


After a shower and some motion sickness meds, I was feeling a bit loopy but ready for some on the boat fun with Mary. We signed up for a 'whole body wellness' lecture thinking it would be a great chance to get a few tips... umm we were completely WRONG! :) First, we were two of six. Second, I was still woozy and loopy. Third, the guy was a COMPLETE nut and we couldn't understand him! At one point we started giggling and of course couldn't stop (felt like alter girls with the giggles... so inappropriate yet so hilarious at the same time!). He totally called us out on it, saying... "do you have something funny you want to share with the group, go ahead, I am waiting." HAHA! Talk about making us laugh even harder... it was second grade all over again and Mrs. O'Neal sent me to the back of the room!

Anywho... after that mess we did a wine tasting class which was great! We learned some basic info and it was fun to compare flavors. I have wanted to take a real class for a long time and this definitely confirmed it.

We had lunch on the pool deck... SO FUN! and I was definitely feeling better at this point (and didn't have any other issues the rest of the trip... thank you Bonine!)

We had some more fun that evening and then got ready for our first day of adventures...

Here we are having breakfast in the port of Ketchikan. Stay tuned for our adventures in this beautiful city!