Crews Letter #2010 02 North to Alaska
Good morning Crew,
In the early 1980’s, we promised ourselves an Alaska Cruise. Nearly thirty years later, this year, we squeezed it in.
The ship, Spirit of Endeavour, is operated by Cruise West On 18 September, 2010, Cruise West Ceased Operations. We feel this is a sad loss.
Like Perception, she is small, not that small; slow, not
that slow; and although she had a schedule, there was time in the plan for
“serendipity”. Like that infamous bridge
in Alaska, this was a cruise to nowhere, Juneau to Juneau in 7 days. Wildlife, glaciers, waterfalls, mountains and
seas; villages, people, boats, cultures, history and arts; passengers, crew and
exploration leaders made this nowhere
everywhere we wanted to go.
To get warmed up for the cruise we started with a land tour from Fairbanks to Anchorage. That is another story: Fairbanks to Anchorage
The Cruise
Day 1 – For starters, we were bused to Perseverance Theatre for “Cedar House: Tlingit Stories” by Ishmael Hope. Two actors presented their tribal heritage and culture by retelling traditional stories.
"It starts with 'The Origin
of Mosquitoes,' basically the origin of sin," he said. "And then it
goes through all these things that happened with the land: how did the salmon
then come to the area? It was dark for a time, how did that come back? How does
fresh water come to world?"
This show set the tone of exploration for the cruise.
During the cruise, only two events were attendance mandatory: the Safety Briefing, first day, and All Guest Disembark, last day. Everything else was just like we like it: optional.
Dinner was interrupted during dessert by a couple of humpback whales just outside the port windows. Many of us ignored dessert for whale watching.
Day 2 – If you left the cabin speaker on, there was the captain’s cheery voice to wake you up at 0630, We did. Endeavour is poised just off Sawyer Glacier at the head of Tracy Arm fjord.
In the first morning, we experienced more “awesome” than a person can stand. Waterfalls, mountains, ice, skilled helmsmanship, a great breakfast, it was all there with one or more exploration leaders point out the next awesome before you could get over the last one.
Day 3 – This morning we were docked in Wrangell. This village has great museum, Ace Hardware store and Chief Shakes Tribal House.
“The
logger would take the last tree; the fisherman would take the last fish.”
In preparation for our visit to Petersburg, the evening program was a Syd Wright video. It was filmed aboard Endeavour’s sister ship, Discovery, before Syd Wright’s death in 1999. He had a lot to say about Alaska, resources, people and fishing.
This video is available at
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2918258555090836951#
The video is an hour long. It’s an hour well spent. If you prefer to tab though we have noted some points of interest:
00:00 Why Alaska John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt
“No
doubt these trees would make good lumber after passing through a sawmill, as George Washington after passing through the
hands of a French cook would have made good food.” – John Muir
6:30 Fishing
12:30 Limited entry law for fishing and prostitution
“Can you remember the urge to
spawn?”
25:00 Shrimp
“Sex life of shrimp…”
26:00 Tlingit Folks
33:00 Origen of Yellow Cedar
35:12 Retirement Adventure
discovery of sea otter and fur seal
45:00 The Last Battle of the Civil War
48:44 The Cussedest Land
Day 4 – Petersburg was founded by Norwegian fishermen in the late 1890’s.
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