Alaska – Start of Our 2008 Summer Travels

This summer’s travels started with a cruise in Alaska. Janet and Tony, JoAnne’s sister and brother-in-law, and we decided it would be fun to go to Alaska this year. We flew standby from Tucson to Denver, crashed at our daughter Sara’s house overnight and spent part of the next day with her and the kids. Jimmy and his girlfriend were there so we got a chance to visit with them too. (Jimmy was installing an air conditioning unit for Sara.) About 3PM we headed for the airport to get the rest of the way to Anchorage on purchased tickets. (Boy, were we glad we had reserved seats – the flights were all really full.) We arrived in Anchorage a few days ahead of the sailing date and just bummed around town and decompressed a little. On Monday, June 23, we caught the Alaskan Railroad for a leisurely trip to Whittier where we boarded the ship, the Island Princess. Janet and Tony did a 5 day land tour before we set sail, so we didn’t see them until Monday afternoon.

We sailed into College Fjord and Glacier Bay to see the glaciers, and along the way saw lots of sea otters, some Humpback whales and Orcas. In Glacier Bay, we got within about 500 feet of the Margerie glacier and actually saw it calve. The sound of the ice cracking and creaking was really something to hear! There was a guest naturalist onboard who gave us insight into what we were seeing and some of the animal and sea life we might see along the way, which was quite informative. We stopped in Skagway (took the White Horse Railway up the pass -- what an engineering feat), Juneau (went to the Rainforest Gardens and the Mendenhall glacier), and Ketchikan ( went to the Saxman native village). Janet and JoAnne also went into a lot of the stores in these towns, oogling the jewelry and various other really nice things. Tony had fishing trips scheduled at these stops. He actually had pretty good luck, catching two large king salmon.

The scenery was absolutely spectacular! And as usual, the food was excellent. (They even had a chocolate buffet one night, after dinner. Right up JoAnne’s alley!!) This cruise was very relaxing since we had three full days at sea. In fact, Jim said, ‘This was my kind of cruise, staying on the ship with less climbing some hill to see something (it seems that the neat things to see are always up a hill)’. We arrived in Vancouver on Monday morning, June 30 and said our good-byes to Janet and Tony. We had such a great time sharing this trip with them. We then caught our flights back to Tucson without any problems. Our furry kids were sure glad to see us (our friends across the street took care of them for us).

Shakedown Cruise to Camp Verde

After we brought the Diplomat home we spent the next two months discovering all the nooks and crannies, adding our own personal touches and re-loading it with all the gear, and then some, that came out of the Bounder. By April it was time to take it out on a shakedown cruise to see just how well everything was going to work. Everyone in the Bay Conspiracy was getting anxious to hit the road again so we all saddled up and headed up the road to Camp Verde, Arizona, about 90 miles north of Phoenix, for a few days of fun and frolic. The new bus performed beautifully. It sailed up the 6% grades on I-17 with a full load and the Saturn in tow and, more importantly, it handled the 6% descents even better with the help of its engine brake.

While at Camp Verde we visited Montezuma’s Castle, an ancient Indian cliff dwelling on the Verde River and explored the old mining town of Jerome which is precariously perched on the side of a mountain about 2000 feet above the Verde Valley. Both of these places are well worth a visit if you happen to be in the area. On the way home we stopped off for a few days in Mesa, Arizona to visit with some very old, dear friends that we have known since before we were married.

Our shakedown cruise was a success; we found a few minor glitches that would need attention before we take off on our big summer excursion but no big surprises and nothing out of the ordinary.