At the risk of being predictably boring, but the facts do have to be recorded, though not for posterity, another restless night and Paula was up and about before the 5:45am alarm. We were just tying up alongside the Celebrity cruise ship, Millennium. As usual, even though it seems ages since I last had to do this, a paragraph for cruisers.
Ship berthed on the port side.
One of our identical el Cheapo, $30 Vodafone pre-pay phones worked, much to our surprise – Paula’s but not mine… AT & T.
We had a compulsory face to face USA immigration interview on board (see below)
Once processed, scanned by the ship’s system with a paper slip confirmation to be shown at the gangway.
No sign of a HoHo bus – it is a small town after all.
A free shuttle to downtown.
Cruise cards checked on returning to the ship.
Scanning ashore of hand luggage on return.
We’d set the alarm for 5:45am as unlike last time, there was no priority for Princess Tours, it was just a free for all with US Immigration boarding at 6am We were due to meet on the dock at 7:45am, so opted for an early immigration clearance before breakfast. So, at 5:45 am we joined the queue. Now I don’t know what it is about some people, but we had a classic case of dumb stupidity. Picture a letter ‘T’. The queue to get into Legends to await processing starts at the very base of the ‘T’. So the queue builds upwards until it gets to the top of the T, and therefore needs to continue either left or right, so quite why, when we got there, the last two couples (the second one in a wheelchair) were jammed hard against the railings at the top of the T, is anyone’s guess. What did they expect everyone else to do? Climb over the balcony behind them, whilst they were totally blocking the thoroughfare?
Anyway, once I’d redirected the last few to bend left, the queue continued to grow at a steady rate.
We were ushered into legend and given a numbered ticket and we were 36/37. After a few minutes, they called up the first few, but nothing more than a good move to get them to sit down in the library, to allow more people into Legends to sit down. Anyway, at 6:15 prompt, they started the processing. They barely glanced at our ESTA confirmations and the very friendly staff despatched us both within a matter of seconds, so we were out the door at 6:21. Brilliant and full marks to them. Better still, after we’d had breakfast and were heading down to meet on the dock for 7:45am, there was no Immigration queue at all. So, our ploy of booking a Princess tour just to guarantee getting off promptly, backfired spectacularly.
No worries. We were on the dock early enough for the 7:45 meet and at 7:55, on our coach, still awaiting two stragglers…
Off then to one of the few repeat tours we have ever done, the dog sledding experience. We did this in 2012 and loved every second of it and we enjoyed it again.
This time, we played canny. When first led to the large compound where the 85 dogs are held, we knew we were in group 2, so stood well towards the exit to where they were showing off Hugo – a TV dog who is nothing like the dogs used. This meant that when they called our group, we were first and hopped onto the front seats of the buggy! Last time we weren’t so smart and were at the rear.
The format was the same as before (read the 2012 blog – link on the right!) but this time, the young lady giving the talk and wrapping up ‘Robin’ in his protective gear, wasn’t as good a presenter as last time. Poor old Robin, the dog, was happier being patted by cruisers, than by being the demo for the protective gear they wear in the snow. He looked quite bored!
This time, the puppy hold didn’t result in a doggie donation to the jacket décor. Also, the shop didn’t have as much merchandise as in 2012, so sorry Jules, no dog paw pendant like Mum’s.
Paula did buy a limited edition print though, signed by the Seavey family, and had her pic taken with Grandpa Seavey, the first of the family to have success in the Iditarod.
A run back then to the ship where we dropped off the print before returning to catch the free shuttle bus to town. The weather out was occasionally quite misty, so much so that at times, even the top of the Celebrity ship was almost shrouded. Now you can say what you like about women drivers, but when the lady bus driver (who claimed to be local), driving a shuttle coach only from the ship to let’s face it, a 5 street town with a few crossroads, takes a wrong turning, you really do have to wonder, especially when we both knew she’d taken a wrong turn and we’d only been to Seward once before, four years ago.
We ambled around a while and poked our noses into several shops, where prices certainly varied. We then opted for what turned out to be a surprisingly good coffee and a delicious ham and cheese croissant (warmed - $6), served by 2 Bulgarians, in the same café as last time - ‘The Sea Bean’ café on 4th Ave. It goes without saying that the place had several customers taking advantage of the free Wi-Fi.
Exactly as in 2012, it started to drizzle, so we opted to shuttle back rather than walk back, and this time, our driver, Kade, attracted a lot of attention by virtue of his headgear.
We thought about hopping off at the stop before the ship, where there were various shops but returned to the ship.
Then Paula developed acute stomach pains again, so at about 6pm, or just after, we headed down to see the doctor - Paula really just wanting some Buscopan. A couple of minutes later, over the tannoy, “Good evening ladies and gentleman, this is your Captain speaking.” Uh’uh, here we go again. “You may have noticed a lot of activity on the dockside. We are still loading supplies and will now be leaving about 3 hours later than planned.” Could have been worse. We had noticed in the morning, that the gangway down to the dock was extremely steep, even for the able bodied. That was bad enough, but the ship’s loading deck seemed to be a deck lower than the dock, so instead of a succession of fork lifts and pallets replenishing the 8 days’ worth of supplies, they were having to use a crane to lower the pallets, one by one, which was very slow.
Anyway, ninety minutes later, Paula was finally despatched from the medical centre, having endured blood tests, (that was a struggle, getting the blood out!); an ECG (even an ultrasound heart scan); taking 1 Buscopan and getting an informed talk from the Senior Doctor about the various medications she’s been taking, and their effects on the body’s systems. She also ended up with a bill for just over $400 – just $1.30 was for the Buscopan.
On then to the buffet where most of our table mates were and I had a very tender lamb shank. Paula just had a jelly. Very wise in the circumstances. With a day at sea tomorrow, hopefully, she’ll be OK for our planned whale watch trip at Icy Strait point, the day after.
We were just about getting ready for bed by the time the ship departed, so skipped the sailaway on deck 11.
Overall, a good day though, and we did enjoy the dog sledding experience again, even though it isn’t on snow. Good to be on land again too, so this was really our turnaround point for this cruise. Geographically, we are now heading for home and for a while, it will also get warmer, other than up against the glacier of course.
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