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Sharon and Shirley had a less eventful journey to mass today, and when they returned, we all went up to the Vista Dining Room. Today is another sea day of scenic cruising, hopefully through the fjord of Tracy Arm. I had the South Western Omelet, while the mothers both chose French Toast, and Sharon went with her traditional American breakfast of scrambled eggs. The skies were clear and blue and trouble-free. On Sharon’s first cruise to Alaska with me, our day in Tracy Arm was hampered by inclement weather with fog as thick as the split pea soup they served on deck. Today, visibility should not be an issue, and the only question will be whether the ice will permit us to approach the glacier. Sharon and I had stern facing seats near the ship center, offering a fantastic view of the trailing wake and the narrowing land on either side, which was barely in sight at the start of our meal. Near the end of breakfast we spotted a dolphins cutting through the water, paralleling our cruise ship but outside the wake. Sharon wondered at first if this was part of the wake, but it clearly wasn’t.
After breakfast, we made our way to the Piano Bar for a challenging game of Scattegories. Teams have a list of categories, such as Types of Flowers, and then a Key-Letter is chosen, such as “D”. Teams write down one answer starting with that letter, such as “Daisy”, doing this for each category. Teams have just under ten minutes to complete words for all categories. Words only count as a point if no other team has the same words. If an answer consists of multiple words (first word starting with the key letter), one point is awarded for each word that also starts with that letter. We did not do well at this game, as our answers mostly got cancelled. We had one double answer that counted, starting with “B” for things found in hotels… “Bed Bugs”. But by far, our answer for things that are bright starting with “W” got the largest amount of laughter. It was also the first answer that was challenged by another team, but the game moderator overruled the challenge as was her prerogative, stating that our submission of “Women” was a valid answer.
Sharon made her way to her 4-star reception with the Captain. She said not many people were there. There were 2 women who got their 100 day medals and one woman who has 812 days. She only went since they had called and put her on the spot about whether she was coming. We planned to skip the Mariner’s Luncheon, for one thing, my mother as a first-time HAL cruiser, wasn’t invited, so we would all eat in the Lido. But first there was Bath Robe $40,000 Jackpot Bingo. Sharon was already there when we arrived, and it was her turn to buy the cards. I took a picture of “My Three Daughters” in their bath robes before the game started. Sharon’s mom got to stand, needing just one number, but she did it just as someone else called “Bingo”. My mom got within three on the Jackpot blackout bingo; but alas, we will need to return to play another day. This is quite a dry streak for Sharon. Today’s group was not quite as large as the game yesterday, but the first game had a $260 jackpot (shared among four winners). When Alex Bling the Bingo King was explaining the rules for the Jackpot Game, someone asked the question of “What happens if someone wins the Jackpot Prize? Do they also win the $650 regular game prize for card four?” The answer by Alex was “Yes, but who really cares if you win the jackpot?” The person from the back who had asked the question then piped in, “I care.” One of Alex’s stupid jokes was, what happens when a red boat collides with a blue boat? Everyone is marooned. Ugh.
Up in the Lido, we found a table and staked our claim. Sharon and Shirley departed to get burgers from the grill out by the pool. My mom and I waited in line for the hot entrée. My mom had the Wiener schnitzel, which she enjoyed. I tried a little of that as well, along with a small piece of lamb and some fish and chips (just to annoy Sharon). Their fish and chips was actually quite good and light. I also tried the curry pumpkin soup that was very tasty.
Sharon and the moms then went up to the Crow’s Nest for the upcoming scenic viewing. I went to the cabins and picked up my jackets, and the jackets for the moms, in case they’d be needed out on deck. As we approached Tracy Arm, the first glacier that was pointed out by the guide over the public announcement system was Sum Dum Glacier, so named because natives claimed that this was the sound that was made by its receding ice. This glacier is no longer a tidal glacier, and the bottom of the glacier is well up on the rocky cliffs. John Muir was one of the first people to suspect that places like Tracy Arm and Yosemite were formed by glacier movements; previous thinking held they were due to earthquakes. John Muir came to Tracy Arm to study the geology. The local Coast Mountains contain many fjords. Our guide informed us that fjords are U-shaped valleys cut out by glaciers and filled with sea water. Our ship maneuvered through red and green buoys to enter the Tracy Arm fjord. Some ice bergies (house-size), growlers (bus-size) and plenty of brash ice began to appear on the water, increasing the deeper we got into Tracy Arm. First we came to “The Bend”. As one might expect, the floating ice will melt more quickly from sea contact than from air contact. When the center of mass changes enough, the ice may suddenly flip. Many of the ice bergies contain deep blue and aqua colors that result from the ice density and oxygen trapped in the ice. The higher frequency blue light is the only wavelength capable of penetrating the ice, so this is what we see when conditions are right. When glacier ice touching sea water breaks, or calves from a glacier, it falls into the sea, and sometimes this can be spectacular as we saw on our last trip to Alaska. The natives call the sound of calving as “White Thunder”.
Around “The Bend” the ice began to increase as we approached the “S-Turn”. Our guide was not confident of how far we would be able to proceed; evidently, it is rare for cruise ships to make it all the way to where the base of South Sawyer Glacier can be seen meeting the sea. The trees on the land, now getting increasingly close as we made our way down the fjord have begun to change from the spruce and hemlock that we saw at the entrance to the fjord. We saw Sawyer Island ahead of us. Sharon and her mom were up on deck, and spotted the nest of the two eagles that inhabit the small island. Up ahead, South Sawyer Glacier was coming into view, but the final leg of the “S” stretched out below and blocked our siting of the glacier base. The brash ice was thick about us, and the guide was not encouraging on our prospects to continuing on, and seem to feel the captain had a decision to make. We moved past the island, and there didn’t seem to be any change in our course or positioning to rotate the ship to return back out the fjord, defeated by today’s ice. Clearly the island’s rocky sides must drop precipitously fast into the ocean because for my land-faring eye the ship seems to be precariously close. South Sawyer Glacier was growing nearer and nearer and finally we passed beyond the final viewing obstruction, then more and more of the three-quarter mile base of the glacier touching the ocean was right there before us. We had come to where few cruise ship passengers get be, and enjoy the magnificence of 200 foot ice face that we see above the waterline. I’ll take the word of the guide that the ice extends another 900 feet down into the sea. This really opens one’s eyes to appreciate the power of these glaciers over the eons to have carved out this fjord, and to the depths that it reaches, this glacier basically being an eleven hundred foot ice formation that is classified as stable, that is the ice calving into the sea each year is replaced through the formation of the 24 miles of ice behind it each year. The companion North Sawyer Glacier, that we were able to see on our departure has been classified as receding. Seals were spotted on many of the growlers passing by, including a mother nursing her young pup, of which Sharon got a photograph. The seals seek the refuge of the fjords to bear and raise their young, as Orcas don’t typically come this far in hunting, preferring the open waters of the ocean where their pack like hunting tactics give them an advantage and their prey have fewer options for getting out of the water. Orcas have been known to try and bump seals off of growlers by attacking from below; and, seals have been known to jump into small fishing boats to escape these black and white predators.
As we slowly reversed our path back out Tracy Arm, my mother and I decided to go take part in the Pinot Noir Wine Tasting. We finally found an event that didn’t have a big line. In fact, just two other people had come to taste wine. A few others came by, and might have stayed but left when they found out it wasn’t free. The cost was $3 per wine, and up to three wines. If you buy a bottle of the wine, they will subtract the $3 from the price for that bottle. They also provided three types of cheese. There were two California Wines and one Italian Pinot Noir. We both preferred the Castle Rock. But we also both felt that we preferred the French Pinot Noir that we had purchased on the first day as part of Sharon’s 4-star three-bottle deal. And with this bottle coming in at $43 per bottle, we decided to stick with what we had.
We went to dinner at the Pinnacle Grill. We had a terrific window-side table for four and watched the ice thin and the many tiny waterfalls making their ways to the sea down the glacier hewn cliffs passing our view. I had considered getting the filet mignon as well, but in the end decided on the rib eye… the more manly steak as Sharon would say. They brought around the daily special complimentary appetizer, and today’s treat was lobster flan. I must say, I’ve never had, or even heard of, lobster flan. It looked, and had the texture of flan served in a tiny cup, and was really quite tasty, indeed flan that tasted like lobster. I convinced my mom to at least try it, and I’m proud of her for trying something new, but I think there was just too much peer pressure for her to say she didn’t care for it. I mean, I didn’t even get her normal PC response of “It’s okay” with a smirk on her face or a scrunched up nose if she really doesn’t like something. Shirley didn’t even consider trying it. Sharon stuck her spoon in hers to make it look like she tried hers. Yes, I came to her rescue and ate hers as well so the chef would feel like he’d given us a complete flop. One thumb up, three thumbs down. For my appetizer I had the spicy coconut milk soup with chilis and lemon grass, a dish I’d had in Antarctica and is one of my new favorites. For me, it makes up for the wonderful French Onion soup that they used to offer, but it would be nice to have that as well every now and then. I know my mother would have enjoyed it, much more than the Daily French Onion soup offered in the Vista Dining Room. For my second appetizer, Sharon ordered the jumbo shrimp cocktail. I forgot to get extra cocktail sauce on the side. Unless you plan to just dab a smidgeon on the tip of your shrimp, there is no way to thoroughly cover your shrimp in this horseradish rich sauce when it lays on a bed of lettuce strips, even though they give you quite a bit of it. The shrimp were of course wonderful. Everyone else was waiting for the main course to begin eating, except for the terrific homemade bread: sour dough rolls, white bread, dark bread and those crispy sesame and poppy seed covered crispy things (what do they call these things? I don’t know, but they’re delicious). My mom and Sharon ordered their small filets medium today; but, Shirley stuck with medium-well. Everybody agreed the steaks were wonderful. I had the scalloped potatoes, but probably would have preferred the whipped potatoes that Sharon had. My mom had a baked potato with asparagus. Shirley had a baked potato by itself. They both decided to eat just half of the giant potatoes that they received. Then the big decision came for dessert… where is all this food going to go (I already know the answer to this one). I ordered the chocolate soufflé with the Grand Marnier white sauce. My mother had asked earlier when she first read the dessert menu whether she would like the marinara sauce. She says that she didn’t have her glasses on. In the end, the two mothers ordered this as well, and both agreed they preferred the chocolate sauce from the previous evening. As for me, initially I wasn’t a big fan of this white sauce either, but it’s beginning to grow on me (literally). Sharon, when assured she could have some of my chocolate soufflé, needing at least a bit of chocolate for dessert, decided on the Pinnacle’s signature Jerry Garcia Baked Alaska, and she ate every bit of it, and a bite or two of my soufflé. I think she was expecting more of my dessert because I had told her when we started; she could have it all if she wanted. When she started eating her Baked Alaska, I started slowly on my soufflé, but I eventually developed a tempo, which far outpaced how quickly Sharon could finish her quite large dessert. So I’m afraid there wasn’t any of mine left when she eventually turned her attention to my plate. That’s about the time I began to think that I probably shouldn’t have eaten the whole thing.
Dinner had taken an hour and one-half, and it was now 8pm. We decided to rush to the Vista Showroom, me ahead to grab some seats if I could find them, and they would follow at a mother’s pace. There were no seats to be found, standing room only, and I watched for a bit, then checked the other side. Then I waited by the elevators for the other three, who eventually did show up. I said the magician is putting on a great show, Master Illusionist Leo Ward is very funny and the show should be great, but there is nowhere to sit. The consensus was to go to the Piano Bar. I decided to stand and watch the show for a bit. It was wonderful, great entertainment, and I didn’t even mind that I was standing. And they guy he “borrowed” the $20 from during the show, did eventually get his bill back at the end, in a magnificent finale of an illusion. The poor guy was the butt of some of the humor, like when Leo asked near the end of the show, if everyone was enjoying the show, and there was loud applause and cheering. Leo noted, “Well this guy’s not cheering… all he can think about is his twenty bucks.” Then he turns to the rest of the audience and observes, “But I think he’s learned a valuable lesson!”
After the show, I met up with the others in the Piano Bar. We reminisced a bit about the cruise so far, and the fun to come, and decided that we had a big day up ahead and we went to our cabins to get some rest.
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