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The Coastal Classic train - 1
And what a 'classic' American train it is!Today is a very exciting day, a very exciting day indeed; because, today we join our cruise ship. But first, we have to get to our port of embarkation in Seward, about 140 miles from Anchorage and we're doing the journey in style, namely 'Goldstar' on the Alaska Railroad, Coastal Classic service. However, this service does come at a cost, namely..........getting up at 5.00am, to check out of the hotel, hop in a taxi for a two minute ride to the station (too far to walk with all our luggage!) and then check in for the train. To be honest, it was a bit of a bun fight at the station, but we were lucky because Celebrity Cruise Lines had a truck waiting to take all our main luggage direct to the ship and all being well, the next time we see the bags, they should be in our Staterooms (Celebrity's posh name for all the cabins!).
On checking in at the train station, we found that whilst Mandy and I were in the same carriage as the Forbes, we were, unfortunately, 10 rows apart and a good tip here is to ensure that your travel agent books you as
The Coastal Classic train - 2
Inside our panoramic carriage. one party, to give you a chance of sitting together. Breakfast is a little trickier for groups with odd numbers, because seating is in two's and four's and they definitely can't seat five together. Although we would have much preferred the company of the Forbes family, Mandy and I were seated with a very chatty couple from Florida and we had a very enjoyable breakfast of absolutely delicious French toast and bacon.
This is a beautiful train journey of about four and a half hours, in a classic American train. The Goldstar service has very comfy seats in the upper tier of the carriage, with panoramic windows and a cracking sit down breakfast included; well worth the extra cost and the journey was terrific. To be fair, the first part of the route followed the road which we were on yesterday, tracking the Turnagain Arm and the Cook Inlet, but after that it moved inland, through the mountains and along pretty valleys with lots of super views, although still, unfortunately, partially obscured by the smoke.
We pulled into Seward bang on time and the next step was getting to the cruise terminal. It's actually no problem really and
The Coastal Classic train - 3
The engine powering through the smoke and round the bend. although the signage is surprisingly poor, the route was fairly obvious - (just look for the big ship and walk in that direction!), although it took a good 20 minutes. On arrival at the terminal, the operation is very slick and in our case, with only one ship in, it was all devoted to us! Through check in and security, we were then up the gangway and on board the Celebrity Millennium, our home for the next 8 days.......and, a pretty big home it is too!
Our allotted boarding slot was 11.30 to noon (you could choose what you wanted ) and we were there bang on schedule and as we boarded, glasses of fizz were thrust in our hands and............the selling began!! To be honest, it wasn't too bad, but they were very keen to sell you upgraded drinks packages, specialty dining packages and shore excursions, none of which we bought, but I will share some tips from our experience in the next post.
After the obligatory pose for a group photo, we went off to our respective rooms, although we knew that they wouldn't be fully ready for another hour or so. As expected, our Stateroom
The Coastal Classic train - 4
A smokey view across Cook Inlet. wasn't quite ready, but there was a sign on the door inviting us to leave our hand luggage and then go and explore the ship. There was also an envelope containing our all important SeaPass cards, our ID cards for the next 8 days, giving us access on and off the ship and enabling us to charge any purchases to our account. There is no cash used onboard (other than in the casino) which could make it very dangerous, because charging stuff to the SeaPass card us very easy indeed!
The ship was scheduled to sail from Seward at 8.00pm tonight and we, therefore, had the afternoon to spend in town. We used the free shuttle bus from the ship to downtown Seward and then wandered around the town which, a bit like Anchorage, has no great architectural merit, but is also set in incredibly beautiful surroundings. Once again though, the problem was smoke. Seward is surrounded by spectacular mountains but.........we could barely see any of them! So instead, Mandy and Lily wandered the shops and Steve, Sarah and I found a nice bar to spend some time, in fact, a bar that was part of the Seward Brewing
The Coastal Classic train - 5
Lakeside parking spot for float planes belonging to some of the houses. Company, with some excellent craft beers!
After meeting up again and taking a little stroll along the waterfront, we picked up the shuttle bus once more and headed back to the ship, by which time our rooms were fully ready and............very nice they were too. The ship had been completely refurbished earlier this year and it showed. Mandy and I had splashed out on a stateroom (number 7163) with a balcony, which gave us a lovely bit of extra space. The bed was very comfortable, there was a good shower in an excellent bathroom and there was stacks and stacks of storage space. This would definitely do nicely for the next 8 days!
Our luggage arrived shortly after and for the first time in nearly two weeks, we actually unpacked! The Forbes' bags took a bit longer to arrive and more importantly, one piece of hand baggage (containing all their wash stuff AND all of Steve's pills), had not turned up with the other bags, which was a touch worrying, to say the least! We had all managed to shower and change and decided to head for dinner in the Metropolitan Restaurant, which was excellent (once again, I'll
The Coastal Classic train - 6
A view in one if the valleys. talk about dining on board in the next post), and great news, when we had finished dinner at about 9.30, Steve's 'lost' bag was sitting outside their room. And with that relief, we made our way to bed, after another long, pretty exhausting, but really enjoyable day.
Day 2 on the ship and what luxury; we are sea the whole day today, so no excursions or any real time pressures and as a result, we were actually able to have a lie in and didn't meet for breakfast until just turned nine. A daily newsletter is delivered to each stateroom and this gives a timetable of the multitude of events happening on board, throughout the day, for all shapes and sizes and all manner of tastes. Steve, Mandy and I decided to go to a presentation on the operation of the kitchens, where we were introduced to the battalion of head chefs and talked through how they feed 2,350 passengers and 950 crew each and every day. We were then taken on a tour of the kitchens to see how some of the key areas operate and as you would imagine, it is a massive operation, from making their
The Coastal Classic train - 7
Our locomotive on arrival in Seward. own fresh items such as bread, pasta, pastry and ice cream to catering for a wide range of dietary requirements from the many nationalities on board, both in the passenger mix and that of the crew.
It was a fascinating hour and when it finished we joined Lily and Sarah at a seminar on getting the best out of (a) your iPhone and also (b) from the Celebrity Cruises App (which is really useful and is connected to the ship's WiFi for free) and even in the few minutes we were there, I learnt some handy tips regarding the iPhone. In the afternoon, we entered two back to back quizzes with a team name of 'The Famous Five', one on 1970's rock music and the other on general knowledge and we performed pretty well in both, especially the music quiz where we scored 24 out of 30, losing out to an amazing score of 28.......although I reckon they might have been using the Shazam App on the quiet to help with their answers, ha ha!
However, all of the above were merely sideshows to the main event of the day, the visit to the mighty Hubbard Glacier. Although,
Walking to the cruise ship - 1
The only signage we saw, but I guess it was pretty obvious! we could have watched from our balcony, we were advised to go on deck to get as full a view as possible, remembering of course, that our balcony was only on one side of the ship! The Captain opened up the Helipad on deck 4 and this was a good option, because you had to climb up some fairly steep stairs, which would have discouraged many people and whilst busy, it was far from crowded
The Hubbard Glacier located off the coast of Yakutat, about 200 miles north west of Juneau, is a truly awesome sight and another one of those natural wonders, where the best pictures are stored in the mind and not on the camera. The glacier is the longest tidewater glacier in the world at 76 miles and unlike many others around the globe, it is still growing and this is despite the fact that the impact of the tidal flow, means that lumps of ice are regularly calving off the glacial mass and crashing into the sea. And when I say regularly, I do mean regularly, because every few minutes we could hear a crack, then a sound like rolling thunder, followed by a boom
as the ice hit the sea; quite amazing to watch. The Glacier is, of course, flowing all the time and apparently, it takes 400 years for the ice created at the top of the glacier to reach the sea and it is a sobering fact to think that the ice that we saw crashing into the sea is 400 years old!
Before we left home, we looked at which excursions we fancied booking and one that was available was a smaller boat that left the ship to get up close and personal with the glacier, but we decided to give it a miss, partly because it would cost around £1,000 between us, but also because we had heard that if the weather and sea conditions are good enough, then the big ships can get pretty close anyway. But as the smaller boat left the 'Millennium', with us still about 8 miles away, we wondered whether we had made a mistake, even though we still had a great view of the Glacier from where we were.
The ship was going very slowly and we thought we had got as close as we could, but no, it kept edging forward,
Seward - 1
The views really would have been amazing, if it hadn't been for the smoke...... 6 miles away, 5 miles away, 1.5 miles away and still the Captain wasn't finished. The weather was perfect and the sea was like a millpond, apparently the best conditions they had seen all season so far and still we got closer before stopping an incredible distance of less than half a mile away from this wall of ice that stretches an unbelievable 8 miles wide and towers over 500 feet above the sea. By this time, more people had come on to the helipad and so we all adjourned to our cabin, to have a private show of the port side view from the balcony, but then, to top it all, the Captain performed a slow 360 degree turn of the ship, turning our private show into our own effective IMAX view of the whole Glacier. A totally memorable experience.
Although we have spent the whole of Day 2 at sea, this cruise is already living up to everything we hoped it would be and more. Tomorrow, we have our first stop, in the State Capital of Juneau and it will be interesting to see how much we enjoy the 'onshore' element of the cruise experience.
An
Seward - 2
.....really amazing.... easyish quiz question for today folks:
The home port of the Celebrity Millennium is Valletta, but in which country is Valletta?
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